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The Galaxy S4, which will be unveiled on March 14 and released soon after, will feature the software and hardware to perform eye tracking. According to a Samsung employee who spoke to The New York Times, this technology will allow for automatic scrolling and page turning when your eyes reach the bottom of the screen — and, presumably, it might also allow for eye-controlled video games.
At this point you are probably thinking about the Galaxy S3, which was also rumored to feature eye tracking. In the S3’s case, it turned out that Samsung was merely using the front-facing camera to perform face detection — as in, detecting whether there’s a face in front of the camera or not. As you can imagine, you can’t do a whole lot with such technology, except for turning the display off when no one’s looking. If the NYT’s report is to be believed, the Galaxy S4 will feature real eye tracking that can work out exactly where you’re looking.
As for how this technology will actually be implemented, though, remains to be seen. Eye tracking solutions tend to involve some kind of headset, or at least a camera that’s situated quite close to your eye. Tobii, which has developed eye-tracking hardware that can fit in the bezel of your laptop (pictured right) or desktop monitor, probably has the smallest eye-tracking solution on the market — but it’s much too big to squeeze into a smartphone. Tobii has demoed a pair of eye-tracking spectacles, but still there’s too much hardware to squeeze into a smartphone. (See: Tobii’s eye-tracking implementation in the new Hyundai concept car.)
In all likelihood, we’re probably not looking at full, mega-high-resolution eye tracking in the Galaxy S4. It won’t be as gimmicky as the S3, but don’t expect to play the next Call of Duty title on the S4 using your eyes. The most likely implementation will probably involve some software that fuses together a bunch of signals from multiple sensors. One front-facing camera might track your eyes, while another might track your head movements (which need to be subtracted from your eye movements). Throw in some inertial data from the smartphone’s accelerometer and gyroscope and you might be able to work out when your eyes reach the bottom of the page.
It’s worth noting that Samsung has registered the trademarks for Eye Scroll and Eye Pause, where Eye Scroll is described as “computer application software having a feature of sensing eye movements and scrolling displays of mobile devices.” Presumably, then, this feature will have enough resolution to at least detect your eyes moving up and down. It remains to be seen how much CPU time and battery life these features will consume, but I suspect it won’t be cheap. Maybe we’ve finally stumbled across a reason for the Galaxy S4 to have an eight-core Exynos Octa SoC… (See: Our full Galaxy S4 hardware and software explainer.)
Now read: Eye tracking is the future of high-speed, maximum accuracy input |
Inevitably, the referendum result has led to calls for a return to some of the measurements that Britannia used when she ruled the waves. Ronnie Cohen suggests an underlying reason.
It is reported that a previously unknown politician who last year unsuccessfully challenged Mrs May for the leadership of the Conservative Party is now back in the news suggesting a possible return of pounds and ounces. It is claimed that some manufacturers and traders favour the freedom to sell in non-metric units, or that this will promote deregulation or defend British tradition and heritage.
The call for a return to pounds and ounces in the marketplace is surely not about tradition, heritage or deregulation but about traders’ self-interest. If it were about British tradition and heritage, why has there been no similar call for a return to gallons? Apparently, the continued sale of fuel by the litre is quietly accepted by all.
Traders use the smallest units that are permitted. They do so to make their products look cheaper or the quantities larger than the competition even when they are not. By doing this, they can quote a lower price (e.g. 50p/lb is the same as £1.10/kg). Here are several examples of this practice:
Car manufacturers generally prefer horsepower over kilowatts in descriptions.
Estate agents generally prefer square feet to square metres and acres to hectares in descriptions.
Some small shops and market traders prefer pounds and ounces to kilograms in sales of fruit and veg.
Delicatessen prices are often per 100 g not per kilogram.
Hence, there was no resistance when gallons were replaced by litres for fuel sales at petrol stations about 30 years ago, and there were no “metric martyrs” at the petrol pumps. So why has there been resistance from some small shops and market traders to the replacement of pounds by kilograms for the sale of meat, fish, fruit and veg? Probably because they prefer to use the smaller unit to appear cheaper than the supermarkets. Litres are smaller than gallons but kilograms are larger than pounds.
A classic example of the preference for smaller units is the change from square metres to square yards by one carpet retailer in the 1970’s. As Jim Humble recalls in “Historical perspectives by the last Director of the UK Metrication Board”,
“The product which brought all voluntary retail initiatives to a full stop was the experience of the floor covering and carpet retailers. Their 1975 change to sales by the square metre started well, but in 1977 one of the major High Street retailers found enormous commercial advantage in reverting to sales by the square yard. Consumers could not be persuaded to believe that goods costing, for example, £10 per square yard or £12 per square metre were virtually priced the same. Consumers bought, in very significant volume, the apparently cheaper priced imperial version. Metrication of carpet sales entered into full scale reverse and the Chambers of Trade and retail associations pressed for firm Government leadership, i.e. compulsory cut-off.”
(Source: http://www.ukma.org.uk/articles/jhumble)
This classic example explains why the supporters of pounds and ounces favour freedom of choice – once the use of the smaller unit becomes commonplace, all will have to follow to avoid appearing over-priced. Consumers will face a period of confusion and the challenge of hexadecimal arithmetic that was last taught in schools in the 1970s, the gap between ‘global Britain’ and reality will widen further, and the aim of a single, simple and logical system of measurement, which everyone is familiar with and understands, will become even more remote.
And, of course, like the USA, we will find it even more difficult to earn our living in a world that has moved on.
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Oakland laying groundwork for Occupy eviction
Mayor Jean Quan holds a dove to release at the Northern California Interreligious Conference on Friday, Nov. 11, 2011 in Oakland Calif. Mayor Jean Quan holds a dove to release at the Northern California Interreligious Conference on Friday, Nov. 11, 2011 in Oakland Calif. Photo: Mathew Sumner, Special To The Chronicle Photo: Mathew Sumner, Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Oakland laying groundwork for Occupy eviction 1 / 1 Back to Gallery
After an intense day of behind-closed-door meetings Friday, Oakland officials are moving forward with plans to evict Occupy Oakland from Frank Ogawa Plaza.
The eviction, which has the blessing of a majority of the City Council and the reluctant concurrence of Mayor Jean Quan, is likely to come sooner rather than later.
That's the word we're getting from several officials who were in on the meetings Friday, trying to find a way out of the mess surrounding the month-old encampment outside City Hall.
The first move: The notice that police handed out to Occupiers on Friday afternoon, telling them all tents, cooking utensils and the like must go and that anyone sleeping in the plaza overnight "will be subject to arrest."
The order came after an afternoon meeting that included Quan, interim Police Chief Howard Jordan, City Administrator Deanna Santana and City Council President Larry Reid.
According to sources, Quan went into the meeting asking for more time for negotiations with Occupy Oakland, suggesting that its camp be transplanted to nearby Jefferson Park while an unidentified benefactor tries to line up an empty building for the movement.
Time, however, is not something that other officials and public safety workers believe the city can spare. And when the meeting ended, Quan agreed to a police sweep if and when Jordan finds one necessary.
"As soon as we can get the mutual aid set up, we are going to go," said one official, who like others we talked to spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the eviction planning.
Mutual aid means help from surrounding police forces, which was crucial when the city first evicted Occupy Oakland on Oct. 25.
This time, however, securing it won't be as easy.
For starters, the Alameda County Sheriff's Department now wants to be paid, rather than picking up its own costs for deputies' participation.
"It's not an emergency anymore," said sheriff's spokesman Sgt. J.D. Nelson. "They basically allowed this to happen when the mayor allowed the encampment to come back in" after the Oct. 25 sweep.
"It's changed from an emergency call to a planned event," Nelson said.
Other agencies are also balking. The city of Alameda says it wants to be protected from any possible lawsuits that might result from its officers' actions.
Plus, other demonstrations planned next week at UC Berkeley and Cal State East Bay are likely to tie up UC and Hayward police, along with sheriff's deputies.
"So we will likely need to go sooner rather than later," said another source planning the Oakland eviction.
The decision to move ahead with the eviction began after a closed City Council session this week in which several of the council members said it was time for Occupy Oakland to go.
According to those in the meeting, Quan - who has been hammered by both her supporters and detractors for her handling of the Occupy encampment - appeared disengaged.
"It was like she was on another planet," one council member said.
Then came the fatal shooting Thursday evening near the encampment and news reports of fire violations in the camp.
Friday morning, Santana informed the mayor during a conference call with other city officials that she was ready to make an administrative decision on her own.
Quan's staff did not return calls or e-mails for comment. However, in a statement released late Friday, mayoral spokeswoman Sue Piper said the fatal shooting "has elevated concerns about the safety of the encampment and people who also use the space. The risks are too great, and it is time for the encampment to end."
By now, even some of Quan's closest supporters - fearing she could be recalled over her handling of the encampment - are seeing the writing on the wall.
"The bottom line is that Oakland wants the camp gone; the polls show that," Quan's husband, Floyd Huen, wrote to her supporters in an e-mail Thursday. "Also, concretely and practically, the council is unanimous in wanting that, too.
"So even if the mayor wanted to do so (keep the camp in place), she cannot because she does not set policy for the city," Huen wrote. "The council does."
He added, "If you want Jean recalled, then force her to go the way you are asking."
EXTRA! Catch our blog at www.sfgate.com/matierandross. |
Corey Kluber carries himself like an old west Gunslinger on the mound, mowing his enemies down without a hint of emotion. He throws two plus-plus pitches, and when he's locked in his opponents are doomed. His unnamed breaking ball would have had him burned at the stake for sorcery 400 years ago.
However, I've noticed that Kluber occasionally malfunctions during games. He can hum along for innings at a time without allowing a baserunner, but once one reaches things are more likely to fall apart. At the beginning of the year I called it a Klubot glitch that caused runs to duplicate themselves. Now, more than halfway through the year, I think there's more to it than that.
My explanation is that Corey Kluber is a much different pitcher when he throws from the windup compared to the stretch. The first is the ruthless Klubot that nearly threw a perfect game against the Cubs in 2014, and the other is just an above-average fully-human pitcher. I've passed this judgment only using the eye test, so in this article I'd like to take a look at the statistical differences between Kluber in both modes and compare them to the league average.
Admittedly, this isn't a perfect way to tease out the differences. When the bases are loaded, many pitchers return to the windup. Furthernore, the Tribe's Carlos Carrasco and others always throw from the stretch, and the type of base runner and where they are on the diamond also matter. I also checked the previous five years for the league, and the numbers for 2016 are really quite close to the same outside of the increased strikeout rate. Therefore, I've included just the league-wide statistics for the most relevant season: this one.
Kluber's career stats are included to give us an additional frame of reference about what is happening this season. Finally, it's easier to say "from the windup" and "from the stretch" than it is to say "with bases empty" and "with at least one man on base", but I am referring to them interchangeably. The goal here, whether it's a mechanical issue with the stretch or a change in strategy when a man is on base, is to figure out how different Kluber is, and how much wider that gap is than the league average.
All pitchers this season with bases empty
K/9 BB/9 K/BB HR/9 K% BB% K-BB% AVG WHIP BABIP LOB% ERA FIP xFIP 2016 8.63 2.99 2.89 1.27 21.8 7.5 14.2 .249 1.34 .295 100.0 1.27 4.17 4.09
All pitchers this season with runners on base
K/9 BB/9 K/BB HR/9 K% BB% K-BB% AVG WHIP BABIP LOB% ERA FIP xFIP 2016 7.35 3.27 2.25 1.02 20.0 8.9 11.1 .255 1.30 .300 34.4 7.72 4.19 4.29
Kluber this season with bases empty, followed by his career numbers
K/9 BB/9 K/BB HR/9 K% BB% K-BB% AVG WHIP BABIP LOB% ERA FIP xFIP 2016 10.11 2.26 4.48 0.43 27.9 6.2 21.7 .189 0.96 0.254 100 0.51 2.31 3.14 Career 9.92 1.88 5.27 0.66 26.5 5 21.4 .229 1.11 0.3 100 0.68 2.59 2.89
Kluber this season with runners on, followed by his career numbers
K/9 BB/9 K/BB HR/9 K% BB% K-BB% AVG WHIP BABIP LOB% ERA FIP xFIP 2016 7.15 1.79 4 1.19 20.5 5.1 15.3 .260 1.15 0.301 8.8 4.48 4 3.64 Career 8.65 2.24 3.86 0.98 24.5 6.3 18.1 .259 1.19 0.324 27 7.65 3.5 3.28
Now, the differences!
K/9 BB/9 K/BB HR/9 K% BB% K-BB% AVG WHIP BABIP LOB% ERA FIP xFIP '16 Lavg diff. -1.28 0.28 -0.64 -0.25 -1.8 1.4 -3.1 .006 -0.04 0.005 -65.6 6.45 0.02 0.2 '16 Klu diff. -2.96 -0.47 -0.48 0.76 -7.4 -1.1 -6.4 .071 0.19 0.047 -91.2 3.97 1.69 0.5 Career Klu diff. -1.27 0.36 -1.41 0.32 -2 1.3 -3.3 .030 0.08 0.024 -73 6.97 0.91 0.39 '16 Klu vs Lavg, windup 1.48 -0.73 1.59 -0.84 6.1 -1.3 7.5 -.060 -0.38 -0.041 0 -1.27 -1.86 -0.95 '16 Klu vs Lavg, stretch -0.2 -1.48 1.75 0.17 0.5 -3.8 4.2 .005 -0.15 0.001 -25.6 -7.72 -0.19 -0.65
Charts on charts! It's a lot of data all at once, but here's what I've distilled it down to in the differences section: the first three rows show the difference in that statistical category between no men on base and runners on. Essentially, this is my approximation for the difference in performance in each category by pitching from the stretch vs. pitching from the windup. For example, the average pitcher throws 1.28 fewer strikeouts per nine innings from the stretch than they do from the wind-up. Meanwhile, Corey Kluber throws 2.96 fewer strikeouts.
Before we dig too greedily and too deep, here are my surface-level takeaways:
Corey Kluber is still an above-average pitcher whether pitching from the windup or the stretch. This advantage is much more pronounced when Kluber pitches from the windup, because Kluber has a much larger performance drop than the league average pitcher in most of these metrics. 2016 appears to underline an even more dramatic deviation from the league average pitcher for Kluber.
Now, let's take a look at some of the more interesting results we get out of this comparison. In 2016, the league average pitcher walks almost .3 more batters when pitching from the windup then from the stretch. Kluber walks .47 fewer batters this season. This isn't because he is striking more hitters out; as noted, he strikes hitters out much less often this season from the stretch. This drop in his strikeout performance is more than twice as large as the league average. When it comes to batting average, Kluber allows a whopping 70 extra points in 2016 from the stretch, while the league allows only 6 extra batting average points.
There are two more bad things that might be the most important pieces of the puzzle. This season Kluber allows .76 more dingers per nine from the stretch, and his BABIP rises by .047 points. Compare that to the league average of .25 fewer dingers per nine and a BABIP difference of five measly points. Interestingly, the leagues' difference in batting average may be explained by a slightly higher BABIP, but Kluber's higher average may not be.
Are Klubers numbers higher this season than we would expect based on his career? Yes, but he has consistently allowed many more home runs and hits from the windup. This is not just something that is happening in 2016. The numbers indicate that there really might be two different Corey Klubers. Fortunately, this is not one of them:
Drawing on my experience watching him pitch for the last few seasons, I offer this guess: when there are no baserunners, Kluber is a bit more aggressive, and willing to work more on the edges. He throws cutters that dart off of the plate and curves that break toward the other batters box in order to induce a bad swing. If the hitter takes, it's a ball, and if they take a cut, there's almost no way they're going to make contact. Once someone reaches base, the numbers seem to indicate that he throws more balls over the plate. It makes some intuitive sense; if Kluber is throwing more pitches that are easier to hit hard, that explains his consistently elevated BABIP from the stretch. That also explains why he would allow fewer walks while giving up more home runs.
It's also possible that his "stuff" is just much better from the windup. We know that pitchers tend to be a little bit less effective from the stretch, but I'm not inclined to think that this explains everything. The difference in Kluber's numbers indicate a completely different arm. If you set the side by side without context, no one would ever think they came from the same pitcher.
To prove one theory or the other, it would take quite a bit of time digging through PITCHf/x or Statcast to log the movement, velocity, and location of his pitches from the windup and the stretch. I'm not equipped to do so at the moment, and I'm also not very quick at logging and manipulating numbers. For now at least we can show that Kluber absolutely struggles from the stretch compared to the Klubot windup. The Indians would be well-served to try and find a way to bridge the performance gap between the Two Klubers. |
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. -- Tiger Woods was voted PGA Tour player of the year for the 11th time on the strength of his five big wins and return to No. 1 in the world.
It was the third time Woods won the Jack Nicklaus Award despite not winning a major. He made up for that with two World Golf Championships and The Players Championship among his five wins. No one else won more than twice this year, and Woods won the Vardon Trophy for lowest scoring average and the PGA Tour money title.
"It's been an incredible year to have won five times, two of those World Golf Championships and one Players," Woods said on a conference call Friday. "It's been just a fantastic year all around. It's also an incredible feeling to be voted by your peers, and to have that type of respect is something that's very humbling."
The PGA Tour does not release the percentage of votes won or even who finished second.
Jordan Spieth was voted rookie of the year in a race that likely was no contest. The 20-year-old Texan began the year with no status on any tour. He won the John Deere Classic, lost in a playoff at another event, reached the Tour Championship, was chosen for the Presidents Cup team and wound up 10th on the money list with nearly $4 million.
He will be the youngest American -- and first PGA Tour rookie -- to play in the Presidents Cup next week in Ohio. |
The lure of the forbidden can be seen nowhere more clearly than the Parent's Television Council's filthy TV page. Here is the organization that has been responsible for generating millions of complaints to the FCC, and they make it possible to watch those delectably decadent moments over and over again.
In the 1930's the Nazis had the same love/hate relationship with swing music. They outlawed it on their homefront, throwing it into the category of "degenerate" art. But at the same time, they employed it in the service of the fatherland. Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's propaganda minister, assembled a fairly competent swing band called Charlie and His Orchestra to perform Nazified versions of the jazz hits of the day. Led by an English speaking German, Karl Schwendler, Charlie and His Orchestra broadcast on the medium-wave and short-wave bands throughout the 1930s to Canada, the US and Britain.
The idea was to lure the masses in with the irrestible tonic of swing music and then slyly work in the anti-Jewish, American and British lyrics after the second or third verse. The broadcasts of Charlie and His Orchestra were not available in the Fatherland proper, but that only enhanced their legend, and they picked up an underground following in Germany as well. |
Has there ever been a manlier party than the current Liberals? Has there ever been a party oozing with more testosterone, bursting with more machismo, thrusting itself through the political hurly-burly with more irrepressibly tumescent force than this proud collection of men, and in a way, women, who stand now trembling on the threshold of government, ready to seize the reins of this out-of-control mustang and canter triumphantly into a brighter future?
Has there?
Of course, some might say it’s easy for a party to look manly when it’s up against the ALP, or as it’s become known in the corridors of power, "The Vagina Squad". But even allowing for the fact that the current Labor Party is as girly as Miley Cyrus on a unicorn, this current Opposition is incredibly manly, and that’s been hammered home this week by the performance of the manliest man of all, the Honourable Scott Morrison MP. "I want to thank Scott for being man enough to accept that perhaps we did go a little too far yesterday," said Tony Abbott, illustrating the essence of manhood for all to see.
Morrison is what the modern Liberal Party is all about. Along with Christopher Pyne and Cory Bernardi, he is part of the dynamic new breed of conservative pollie that epitomises the Liberals’ key motto: "The Liberal Party — Strong Leadership With Only a Little Bit of Vomit in Your Mouth". And this week he demonstrated it beautifully, showing just the kind of forthright attitude and muscular directness a citizenry requires when it’s trying to defend itself against the external threat of expensive mourners.
For while the rest of us were wringing our hands and rending our garments and moistening our cheeks about the funerals of asylum seekers killed in last year’s boat crash, Morrison, in his masculine way, went right to the heart of the matter: How much does it cost and why are we paying for it?
Now THAT’S what we want from our leaders — straightforward, manly accounting. For what is the most important element of any government? That’s right — value for money. Is it a coincidence that the ascent of this ridiculously feminised government has coincided with reckless spending in every area? Billions upon billions upon useless school halls, wasteful handouts, and of course Peter Garrett’s homicidal mania. And the advent of Julia Gillard has just made things worse — confirming all our worst fears that allowing a woman to become prime minister would just cause her to see the process of government as one big shopping spree. It takes a man — a man like Morrison — to stand up and say "Enough! Stop spending our money on these silly extravagances, and start being responsible with it!"
And as any prudent budgetarian knows, fiscal soundness begins with not splashing out money on every cashed-up heathen who jumps the queue and expects to be showered with luxuries left right and centre. Free medical care, accommodation, funeral attendance … where does it end? I’ll tell you where it ends: with the country up to its eyeballs in debt and turning tricks in the South China Sea just to afford the interest payments on the amphibious landing craft.
But men like Scott Morrison, luckily, are there to nip this kind of profligacy in the bud, if only we’ll let them. Immigration Minister Chris Bowen estimated that flying these people to their loved ones’ funeral would cost $300,000. Three hundred thousand! Do you know what we could have bought with that money? We could have put a deposit down on a nice house! Or bought a few spare cars for Barnaby Joyce for next time he has one of his little turns.
But now we’ll never have these nice things, because the government decided it had to be "compassionate" — which is, let’s be honest, just another word for "pre-menstrual". Because the government doesn’t have any real men in it. No men like Morrison. Just pseudo-men like Chris Bowen, who trips over his feet like a comical butler every time someone rings the country’s doorbell, so eager is he to let them in build them mosques on top of the War Memorial.
Of course, like all great men, Morrison’s manliness is driven by his strong faith. The fact Morrison is a devout Christian should come as no surprise — if ever there was a man who knew how to save money on funerals, it was Jesus. And if there ever was an accurate answer to the question, "What would Jesus do?" it is, "Avoid wasteful spending on the personal excursions of people who aren’t even citizens". It’s all in the Bible, folks. Jesus was a real man, too. He knew the only way to deal with refugees was with a firm hand. Just look at the story of how he drove the moneylenders from the temple because they had no passports.
No doubt it is this innate determination to emulate Christ that makes Morrison so manly. It takes a very special sort of courage to stand against the crowd in this way, to see everyone else weeping and grieving and say, I do not care what anyone else thinks, I am going to stand up for what is important — taxpayer dollars. Because every special interest group under the sun has its spokespeople, but there’s no spokesperson for taxpayer dollars. Who will speak for the voiceless, these poor dollars forced into servitude against their will, enslaved to fashionable ideologies and sinister religious observances? Scott Morrison, that’s who.
And yet, even with this unbelievably macho display, Morrison did not exhibit the full range of his manliness. It was left to his leader — himself a man so manly that when discussing border protection his head briefly transforms itself into a scrotum — to point out just how manly Morrison is.
Because yes, perhaps the greatest attribute a man can have is the willingness to admit his mistakes. There is nothing more manly than a fellow sticking out his chin and confessing to the world that he has been a fool and a rotter and that on sober reflection it probably would have been better to wait until maybe next week before demanding that the grieving relatives of dead asylum seekers stop suckling so voraciously at the public teat.
It takes guts, as Abbott said, to come clean about your poor sense of timing when it comes to funeral-visit-funding-mentioning. It takes the sort of guts undreamed of by the wittering wet-nurses on the government benches, or "moderate" traitors like Judith Troeth, who quite frankly would not know manhood if it jumped up and unhooked her bra. She should probably join the Greens, the natural party of the woman, and take Joe "the human uterus" Hockey with her.
The Liberal Party doesn’t need their type. The Liberal Party, like Australia itself, needs men. It needs studly types like Morrison and Abbott to stay the course, to keep a masculine presence in Australian politics, to keep the great penis of opposition pounding away at this sissy "government", until it finally penetrates the corridors of power and inseminates Parliament with the seed of commonsense. If they don’t, who knows what sort of madcap policies will spew forth from Labor’s barren womb? Who knows what disreputable nine-year-olds will be allowed loose in the community? Who knows what nefarious graves will be tended, or how many millions will be spent on ferrying around the distinctly ethnic opportunists looking to tend them?
Let’s be manly, Australia. Let’s stand up, chests out, heads high, groins proudly upthrust, and put a stop to all this oestrogen-fuelled sappery.
After all, you’ve got to be cruel to be kind. Of course, you’ve got to be even more cruel to be cruel. So, either way, you know.
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On Wednesday morning’s Breitbart News Daily on SiriusXM , former Secret Service officer Gary J. Byrne was asked to talk about the differences between Hillary Clinton and other protectees, such as her husband Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
“Hillary is just not approachable,” he told SiriusXM host Alex Marlow. “The Hillary Clinton that they keep trying to modify and portray on TV – and I’ll remind your audience, at least three times during this past year, you’ve seen her campaign put out, ‘Well, we’re trying to make her look a little bit more pleasant,’ or ‘It’s Hillary 2.0.’ The real Hillary Clinton is the one I talk about in my book, Crisis of Character. She’s cold, she’s distant. According to the FBI Director a couple of months ago, she’s completely incompetent and reckless.”
LISTEN:
“Reckless is really the reason I wrote my book, because that’s the real Hillary Clinton,” he continued. “She’s somebody who’s got her employees that work for her so terrified, when she was First Lady, they were afraid to tell her when she made a mistake. You know, everybody’s human.”
“When you fast-forward to the incident with the email server, and she’s got her staff running around behind her, crushing Blackberries and cell phones with hammers, because she’s too much of a dictator and she’s too incompetent to follow the security procedures that quite frankly should have had her in jail already – if she was anybody else, her clearance would have been pulled, and she would be being prosecuted,” Byrne declared.
Byrne said that when his book first came out, “all the mainstream media, a couple of the shows wanted me on there. When they couldn’t get a copy of the book without signing a non-disclosure, they started dropping. Basically, their motive was to get a copy of the book and get it to Clinton. That’s the way it was reported, that’s the way I see it.”
“Here’s the thing: Good Morning America has George Stephanopoulos on. I stood out next to that guy’s office for over three years. He knows who I am. He knows what the truth is. That’s why they’ve got the Clintons blacklisted. Clearly these people, they don’t want to know what the truth is,” Byrne asserted. “I think most of the American people, even the people that watch their shows, I think they do want to know what the truth is.”
“And the truth is that Hillary Clinton has become so angry – you mentioned about the security detail at the State Department trying to get away from her. Like you said, I talk about it in my book Crisis of Character, she gets so angry one day, sitting in her limousine, she strikes a Secret Service agent in the back of the head with a Bible. That’s not normal behavior. That’s bizarre behavior, and it’s criminal behavior. And that’s the real Hillary Clinton,” he said.
Byrne and Marlow had a little fun mocking the notion of the mainstream media becoming more interested in telling Byrne’s story, now that FBI documents have confirmed so much of what he says about Clinton.
“They’re going to try to get even further and further away from me now, because if this stuff keeps leaking out, it’s going to vindicate me and a lot of other people,” Byrne predicted in all seriousness.
He explained:
It’s just like the stories of all these women Bill Clinton has allegedly assaulted over the years. Eventually, the information comes out. Listen, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to know what the truth is. You just have to be a little bit of an investigator. You know, if it’s standing down by the lake, and it has big yellow feet, and it looks like a duck, and it’s quacking and it’s swimming, it’s a duck. And that’s the way you have to look at these things.
“I wrote my book because I want the American people to know who the real Hillary Clinton is. And it dovetails with everything you’ve seen, because that’s what the facts are. That’s what the truth is,” Byrne said. “I’d like to remind your audience that my unfortunate claim to fame is, I’m the first employee in U.S. Secret Service history to ever be compelled to testify against a sitting President in a criminal law case, and of course that was Monica Lewinsky.”
Byrne stressed that his observations were particular to Hillary Clinton. “Bill Clinton was very pleasant. He was jovial at times, he was humorous. It was a little awkward sometimes, when he tried to engage some of the uniformed people in conversation. They understood little about our procedures at first.”
“For instance, he approached an officer at a post one time, and as he approached him, the officer moved away from him and turned his back to him, because he was looking at the open areas – you know, for an attack,” Byrne recalled. “And the President thought this was an insult. When he told somebody, and it got back to the agency, they said, ‘No, no, no, they’re not doing it to be rude. They’re doing it because that’s their job. If you want to approach them and talk to them, call them out by their title, Officer, and he’ll come and talk to you. But otherwise, they’re going to move away from you and look for the attack.’”
“He was a nice guy,” Byrne said of Clinton. “I wouldn’t trust him to drive my 27-year-old niece home, but he was a pleasant man to work with.”
Byrne said the media blackout of stories damaging to Hillary Clinton was frightening, “because you’re never going to know what the truth is” under a new Clinton Administration.
“Here’s an example for your listeners who are on the fence: what would you have known about Mrs. Clinton’s health issue, if that one person hadn’t been there with a cell phone? You would know nothing. You would have no idea that she could possibly have a serious illness,” he postulated.
“Now, I don’t wish this on her, or anybody else,” Byrne emphasized. “I protected these people for eight years. I have a weird connection to them. I’m not sure I can describe it. I don’t wish them any harm. But that’s just another example of their dishonesty. They hide and spin everything, and anything coming out of her mouth is a lie. They can’t even tell the truth when they can tell the truth. Her husband’s a good example.”
“I’d just like to make a prediction,” Byrne said in parting:
More FBI agents in my opinion, that are disgruntled about the way these investigations are being held, or held back, are going to keep leaking material, and you’re going to see more and more stuff come out, and it’s going to be parallel to stuff you hear in my book, and some of these other books, and what people have been saying all along. Anybody that doubts what I say about Hillary Clinton: read George Stephanopoulos’ book, and read Dee Dee Myers’ book. They say the same things.
Breitbart News Daily airs on SiriusXM Patriot 125 weekdays from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Eastern.
Listen to the full audio of Bryne’s interview above. |
The Russian aircraft manufacturer Sukhoi has declared a flight test milestone for the T-50, before handing over the fifth-generation fighter to the Russian government for additional testing.
Sukhoi completed more than 700 flight tests, which confirmed aircraft requirements set by the Russian ministry of defense, United Aircraft Company said in a July 7 post on Facebook. The company has submitted the T-50 prototypes of the prospective aviation complex front-line aviation (PAK FA) programme for state joint tests, UAC states.
Sukhoi completed first flight of the T-50 29 January 2010 in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, the home of Russia's KNAAZ aircraft manufacturing complex.
With stealthy features and advanced electronics, the supersonic fighter was designed to rival the US Lockheed Martin F-22 fifth-generation fighter. Russia is on track to procure 55 T-50s through 2020, depending on the initial aircraft’s performance, FlightGlobal previously reported. |
This guest post is by SN's web producer Ashley Yeager, who can't remember ever not knowing how to swim.
Sometimes my brother-in-law will scoop up my 2-year-old niece and fly her around like Superwoman. She’ll start kicking her legs and swinging her arms like she’s swimming — especially when we say, “paddle, paddle, paddle.”
My niece, Baby D, loves the water. She often looks like one of the kids captured in famed photographer Seth Casteel’s new book, Underwater Babies. But she probably won’t remember her first trips to the pool — she was only a few months old when her mom first took her swimming. Part of my sister’s reasoning for such an early start was standard water safety. Every day in the United States, accidental drowning claims the lives of two children under the age of 14 years. Our family spends a lot of time at the pool and the beach, so making sure Baby D is protected is a priority.
But there’s another reason my sister was keen to get Baby D to the pool. Loosely based on something our mother told us, it’s that learning to swim early in life may give kids a head start in developing balance, body awareness and maybe even language and math skills.
Mom may have been right. A multi-year study released in 2012 suggests that kids who take swim lessons early in life appear to hit certain developmental milestones well before their nonswimming peers. In the study, Australian researchers surveyed about 7,000 parents about their children’s development and gave 177 kids aged 3 to 5 years standard motor, language, memory and attention tests. Compared with kids who didn’t spend much time in the water, kids who had taken swim lessons seemed to be more advanced at tasks like running and climbing stairs and standing on their tiptoes or on one leg, along with drawing, handling scissors and building towers out of blocks.
Hitting milestones related to motor skills isn’t so surprising, the authors note, since swimming is a very physical activity. A bit more unexpected, they say, are the swimming kids’ advanced skills in language and math — tasks like counting, naming objects and recognizing words and letters. Kids who swam also seemed to be better at following directions. And, in some areas, kids had proportionally better scores on the development tests relative to how long they had been taking lessons.
The authors admit that they can’t conclusively claim that swimming alone is responsible for the developmental advances because the analysis was based on survey data and limited testing with young children. “Simply, we can say that children who participate in swimming achieve a wide range of milestones … and skill, knowledge and dispositions … earlier than the normal population,” the researchers write.
In a 2013 study, a separate set of scientists made an attempt to be a bit more rigorous in their experimental methods. The team looked for differences in motor development between six 7- to 9-month-olds who took swim lessons and six who did not. The study was too small and too short — only four months — to truly be able to identify any differences, the authors say. They argue, however, that the experimental design could set the framework for much more definitive results in the future.
In the meantime, my sister and I are collecting our own data. It’s anecdotal, of course, and possibly a bit biased, but even so, we’ll all just keep swimming. |
(The following statement was released by the rating agency) NEW YORK, July 01 (Fitch) Several recent events point to greater corporate acceptance of the virtual currency Bitcoin as a payment mechanism, according to Fitch Ratings. DISH Network on May 29 said it would accept Bitcoin as a form of customer payment beginning in the third quarter of this year. Expedia said in June that it would begin accepting Bitcoin as payment for hotel reservations, while online retailer Newegg just announced that it would accept Bitcoin as well. In mid-June, Apple made virtual currency app Coin Pocket available for download in its App Store. Coin Pocket is a Bitcoin wallet app that can be used to send and receive bitcoins. As was widely reported, Apple recently added a rule to its App Store guidelines stating "apps may facilitate transmission of approved virtual currencies provided that they do so in compliance with all state and federal laws for the territories in which the app functions." Companies like DISH, Expedia, and Newegg generate meaningful revenue and an increase in payment for products and services via Bitcoin could boost the payment system. However, as we've stated previously, Bitcoin is still small relative to both major payment processors and global currencies despite increases in its acceptance as a payment system. Bitcoin's price and transaction volume have climbed since mid-May, reversing downward trends earlier in the year. The price of Bitcoin rose from $489 on May 21 to $639 on June 30. As a result of this price increase, the average daily transaction volume rose from $47 million per day in May to $61 million per day in June, despite a decline in the average number of daily transactions. For additional information on this topic, please see our report titled, "Sizing Up Bitcoin - Volume Rises with Price in June," available at www.thewhyforum.com. Contact: Robert Grossman Managing Director Macro Credit Research +1-212-908-0535 Kellie Geressy-Nilsen Senior Director FitchWire +1 212 908-9123 Fitch Ratings, Inc. 33 Whitehall Street New York, NY 10004 Media Relations: Brian Bertsch, New York, Tel: +1 212-908-0549, Email: brian.bertsch@fitchratings.com. Additional information is available on www.fitchratings.com. The above article originally appeared as a post on the Fitch Wire credit market commentary page. The original article, which may include hyperlinks to companies and current ratings, can be accessed at www.fitchratings.com. All opinions expressed are those of Fitch Ratings. ALL FITCH CREDIT RATINGS ARE SUBJECT TO CERTAIN LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS. PLEASE READ THESE LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS BY FOLLOWING THIS LINK: here. IN ADDITION, RATING DEFINITIONS AND THE TERMS OF USE OF SUCH RATINGS ARE AVAILABLE ON THE AGENCY'S PUBLIC WEBSITE 'WWW.FITCHRATINGS.COM'. PUBLISHED RATINGS, CRITERIA AND METHODOLOGIES ARE AVAILABLE FROM THIS SITE AT ALL TIMES. FITCH'S CODE OF CONDUCT, CONFIDENTIALITY, CONFLICTS OF INTEREST, AFFILIATE FIREWALL, COMPLIANCE AND OTHER RELEVANT POLICIES AND PROCEDURES ARE ALSO AVAILABLE FROM THE 'CODE OF CONDUCT' SECTION OF THIS SITE. FITCH MAY HAVE PROVIDED ANOTHER PERMISSIBLE SERVICE TO THE RATED ENTITY OR ITS RELATED THIRD PARTIES. DETAILS OF THIS SERVICE FOR RATINGS FOR WHICH THE LEAD ANALYST IS BASED IN AN EU-REGISTERED ENTITY CAN BE FOUND ON THE ENTITY SUMMARY PAGE FOR THIS ISSUER ON THE FITCH WEBSITE. |
Technically, it's a Type-33 Guided Munitions Launcher.
Norm here. Along with regular Tested readers, I've had the pleasure of following along with Harrison Krix's build logs for the Halo Needler prop project that he's been working on since the start of this year. This was a project that began when Harrison and I caught up for a Maker Profile interview late last October, and I tossed up the idea of a collaboration with Tested that would chronicle the journey of one of his props, from concept to completion. We had first met at Whiskey Media's Big Live Live Show where Harrison flew to San Francisco for a segment about prop making, but I had been a fan since seeing photos of his Mass Effect M8 Avenger rifle prop back in 2010. Harrison's prop making skill is renowned in the replica prop community, but just as impressive is his ability to write comprehensive (and comprehensible) build logs documenting his work.
Bringing a fictional video game object into reality is quite a feat, but pulling away the curtain and showing people how the magic is done is what makes Harrison a model maker.
That behind-the-scenes story is what we wanted to get across over the past year of The Volpin Project--both a sense of being along for the ride during the Needler's birth into the world of the real, and a document of the build process though the lens of someone who quit his day job to make these props for a living. Through 15 check-ins with Harrison, we not only saw the Needler literally take shape, but got a crash course in some of the tools and techniques prop makers use--a starting point and invitation for anyone to dig deeper into those topics. If, at the culmination of this project, we left some of you both awed and inspired to make something of your own, mission accomplished.
This page commemorates, consolidates, and celebrates the Needler prop build, summarizing the key milestones from The Volpin Project series. I encourage you to read the entirety of the project build log if you're interested in learning more about prop making, though if you're just here for the pretty photos, that's OK too! Harrison, take it away!
Introductions
The Halo Needler has been on my personal list of stuff I really want to make since I first played Halo: Combat Evolved back in college. The design of this gun has undergone a lot of changes in the past 12 years and six Halo titles it has appeared in, but it's always remained one of my favorites. The complexity of the finished prop rivals that of my Daft Punk helmet replicas, and I couldn't be happier with the results.
A summary of the build is really a listing of numbers: 15 different molds were created for the individual components and 24 cast parts go into the final product. There are 54 LEDs that illuminate the needles as well as various blue accents throughout the body of the gun. The final product is 31 inches long, weighs 10 pounds and can play three sound effects from Halo Reach: power on, semi-auto fire and full auto fire. Also built into the gun is the ability to run the electronics from a wall power adapter or three AAA batteries.
But it all starts with some game screenshots.
Design and Blueprinting
Good blueprints are, in my opinion, the key to a really successful prop. There's an old saying that goes "garbage in; garbage out" which can refer to anything from the quality of materials to the planning of the project. In this case, a good set of blueprints will make sure that all your parts fit together properly and are accurately scaled to one another. It's the foundation of the project, and just like an architect wouldn't make a house without a detailed set of plans, a good builder should take the time to spend a while on solid blueprints.
These have to originate from somewhere, and if you happen to be into making props from video games like I am, then you're in luck. If a game has come out on PC, there is a pretty good chance there's a vibrant and thriving modding community out there for it. These are players and artists who have been able to extract the models and textures from the game and edit or manipulate it in order to create aesthetic or game-changing mechanics mods.
Some games, like Skyrim, even come with a handy built-in model viewer! Halo: Reach, as a console game, doesn't, but I really lucked out and happened to get in touch with a modder who had pulled the Needler’s 3D files out of the game, which I was able to open in Photoshop as an .obj file and manipulate to my needs.
From these models files, I take screenshots from a multitude of angles: top, bottom, sides, front and back, etc. It might be that not every project needs this much detail, but the more you can put into your blueprints, the better. Its a good idea to grab 3/4 angle shots too, showing the piece from other perspectives than just these flat-on views. This will allow you to see how certain panels, lines and segments interact better than a flat angle shot would.
After I source enough screenshots, the individual references are tiled together in Adobe Illustrator. One benefit of vector-based blueprints is that you don't lose any detail when scaling your piece. Scale is another very important element; props that are too big or too small will look incorrect no matter how well built they are. I really lucked out with the Needler, because Microsoft has given their community a whole wealth of information about the HALO universe, and I was able to extrapolate the Needler's real-life length for scale.
Crafting a Prototype
With the blueprints completed, the next step was just as crucial: planning how to build the actual prop and selecting the proper materials. The Needler itself is a combination of many different elements--organic curves as well as geometric edges--and different materials and techniques were suited to making its many components.
The Needler was actually built twice for the purposes of this project. I started off by making the various components as individual pieces, mostly solid, and comprised of various plastics, wood, clay, and resin. These parts, called “masters”, were then molded and later cast in urethane resin. This yields lighter parts composed of one type of material, making them stronger as well. These cast pieces are what make up the finished product. Additionally, castings can be made hollow, which makes running wiring for illumination and batteries much, much easier.
When making the master prop, it’s a good idea to consider the individual components of the piece as their own little projects. You’re not a renaissance sculptor carving your space gun out of a block of marble, and approaching a build in that way tends to get frustrating pretty quick. By breaking the project down into smaller components, you can concentrate on which piece requires what build technique without getting bogged down in making everything look perfect all at once.
I’ll admit I’m not a sculptor of any sort, but I’ve figured out many ways to skirt that shortcoming and use a bit of mechanical engineering and drafting tools to get pretty solid results.
My technique is a pretty simple concept, but it might not immediate jump out as a solution for those starting on their first project. Essentially, you build an object by assembling it from sheets of material (sometimes referred to as “slicing”) from the inside out. This process is convenient when making large objects with flat sides that have a lot of intricate geometry. Beveled edges can be created by using clay or Bondo to fill in the spaces between layers.
Since layering works best with large sheets, there are a lot of material options to choose from. One of the biggest go-to’s in DIY prop making is a cheap and readily available wood called MDF (medium density fiberboard). Think IKEA furniture backing. It is a great starter material that can be shaped with simple tools like a jigsaw and dremel. MDF can go a very long way in a project if you want it to!
A step up from MDF in many aspects is a material called “sintra” or “PVC foam board.” Sintra is a foamed plastic sheet that is lighter, easier to glue and sand, and can take a little bit more detail than MDF. Unlike MDF, it can be heated to take simple curves, making accent details much easier to accomplish. For more intricate details, I used plastics including acrylic and styrene. Both of these materials come in very thin sheets and can be laser cut, shaped with heat, and vacuumformed.
Domes and compound curves are a bit trickier than flat forms and geometric shapes. Many builders will scour hardware stores for similar shaped items and enlist them for parts, but I went something a little more exact. My preferred method is to use the flat views built in the Illustrator blueprints to create an internal framework that defines the outer edges of a curved shape from all three dimensions. What I end up with is a skeleton that can be filled with a variety of materials--foam, clay, resin, or wood--and sanded down into the proper curved form. A little bit of artistic interpretation may be necessary to get the curved forms just right, and some extensive sanding and Bondo work may be necessary. But the frame gives me a definite stopping point, which will go a long way towards getting the curves precise and to scale.
For smaller detailed shapes, I like to use a material called “Apoxie Sculpt” made by Aves. Apoxie is great for sculptors who, like me, kind of suck at sculpting. It’s even better for people who know what they’re doing, but the beauty of this material is how well it sands and smooths out. Apoxie can be drilled, tapped and machined and is incredibly dense and strong. It’s also quite heavy, but again this doesn’t matter with the master parts.
Moldmaking and Casting
At this point, our Halo Needler prop prototype was somewhere around 15 pounds, an amalgamation of wood, foam, Bondo and various types of plastic. While the shape of the whole thing was spot-on, the prop left a little bit to be desired with how heavy and fragile the mish-mash of materials ended up being. The parts here had to be molded, then cast in urethane plastic. This then yielded a piece that is both far lighter as well as more durable than the prototype, since it's all be one cohesive material through and through.
There are many types of techniques to make molds, and just as many types of materials to make molds with--the process I used here was for making hard copies cast in rigid plastic.
The part to be molded is referred to as a “master” or sometimes as the “sculpt." For example the grip of the Needler prototype is made from MDF, Acrylic, PVC, Bondo and some epoxy clay. This is the grip master.
To make the mold, the material I’m used was silicone. The “mold” is anything into which casting material is poured in order to make a copy. Many people confuse the word “mold” with the finished result of the casting process. The pieces that come out of a mold are referred to as “castings." Molds can be made from plaster, resin, silicone, latex--any number of materials based on the end goal of the mold and the part that is being replicated. I used silicone because it is versatile, lasts through many uses, and yields the best results for the type of work I do.
There are two kinds of silicone you’ll run into when making molds: “Platinum cure” and “Tin cure”. Generally tin-cure silicones are cheaper and less prone to curing issues, but less durable and can also shrink over time. Platinum-cure silicones shrink less, are very durable and more archival, but are more expensive and can be finicky about curing depending on environmental factors as well as what kind of materials the mold master has been made from.
The easiest kind of mold to make is a one piece block mold. This is useful for making parts that have a flat back and detail on only one facing side. And if you have a component that has detail on both sides, you can make a two piece block mold, like what you see on the right.
As a simple example of making a one piece mold, a piece of the Needler was placed into a mold box with a flat base. Clay was used to seal the mold box to prevent leaks around the base and edges, and silicone was mixed and then poured over top of the master part. After allowing six hours of cure time (for this particular silicone) the walls were removed, then the master part was demolded from the silicone.
Other parts of the Needler were replicated with more complex molding techniques, such as brush-on moldmaking. The basic premise here is gradually building up layers of silicone onto a part until the desired mold thickness is achieved, and then wrapping that floppy mold in a rigid mold jacket (or mold mother). Once the molds were finished, I was then ready to make copies!
Casting techniques and materials will vary depending on the final use of the piece, but for the purposes of this build I focused on urethane casting resin and leaving out other plastics such as epoxy or polyester. In my detailed build log, I covered the process of casting solid components, hollow parts, and even translucent pieces as well.
Embedding Electronics
Static props are fine if you’re making a sword or a shield, but when it comes to a space combat theme, everything has to have LEDs in it. The Needler ended up having 54. Sound can also lend a bit of fun to a replica, and while it’s always going to be difficult to match the on-screen experience that a surround sound system gives you, it’s still fun to pull the trigger and not have to make the “pew pew” effect yourself.
For the Needler, I started out by making a list of the things I wanted it to do and where/how it needed to do them. Lights had to come on via a switch, and I wanted a “start up” noise to accompany this effect. I also wanted a push button trigger that would toggle between automatic and semi-automatic fire. From my experience with audio in props before, I also knew I’d need a small amplifier to bump up the volume. All of that was a bit much to organize in my head so I drew out a few schematics.
There are a myriad of switches available to hobbyists and a lot of fun tricks you can pull off when you start feeding them into one another. For example, I needed one button to control both semi and automatic firing noises, but the sound chip I decided to use can’t be programmed to swap effects. To get around this, I wired the trigger switch output into a second toggle switch that selects either the automatic or single firing sound effect. The trigger itself is a momentary push button that glows blue, because why not?
Authentic Needler sound effects were sourced from The History of Halo and edited together into one audio file. I ordered a pre-programmed sound module from replicaprops.com, and bought a small amp from Sparkfun. This little mono amplifier made all the difference in the world when it came to the sound effects. I’ve put audio electronics in props before but the speakers have been run directly off the sound chip. For something like a static display ship model where you only want a gentile engine hum this would be fine, but adding an amplifier to the circuit gives the Needler firing noises some much needed oomph.
A handy piece to have around when you’re mocking up your circuit is a breadboard. I used one to mock up the audio and illumination circuit first here to make sure that everything was working as planned and there weren't any faults in the circuit diagram I originally drew.
For illumination, I got my LEDs from superbrightleds.com. LEDs need resistors to properly limit the voltage they receive so they illuminate properly without being damaged. There’s an equation for this, but there’s also a handy website! With a few values for your bulbs and power supply, you’ll have the proper resistors sorted out in no time by going to ledcalc.com.
Embedding the LEDs into the needles was no problem. Each pink LED was individually wired and I drilled a 5mm hole into the back side of each needle. When it came time to mount these into the body of the gun, I just cut off the base at an angle, leaving the straight hole intact to make sure the light shines the correct direction.
The last thing I’ll mention is a bit of a luxury, but when it comes time to install all of these components into a finished prop I prefer to have things on a custom printed circuit board. While it is possible to solder chips and leads onto a piece of generic perforated circuit board and jumper all the connections, custom PCB printing has recently become inexpensive enough for hobbyists to employ even with strict budget projects, provided you don’t mind a couple weeks for production time. I designed these boards in CadSoft’s EAGLE board layout editor, and while that is a very powerful program (even the free version!) it does have a somewhat steep learning curve. My board design was then sent off to oshpark.com for printing.
The Needler is powered by either an AC connection or on-board battery power. I devised a removable battery cover for the rear of the Needler using, but what else, magnets!
Painting and Weathering
Before painting to commence, I had to prep the Needler components by figuring out their mounting points. It’s important to have a plan for assembly of a prop before putting a shiny nice coat of paint on it, because it would be difficult to keep from marring a fancy paint job with all the drilling and cutting that needs to be done. When the individual parts of a project are still raw resin, you can afford to have a scrape here and there figuring out the best way for everything to fit together. Once things are painted, the last thing you want to do is fret over every bit of dust that might damage all your hard work.
Many people might choose to glue their props together, and a lot of my earlier pieces were held together mostly with superglue or epoxy. My preferred method now is to have as many pieces held together mechanically (read: screwed together) as possible. This may be reinforced with a glue joint as well during final assembly, but securing pieces together with bolts and screws ensures that every part goes together the same way each time it’s put together.
With all the holes cut, drilled, tapped and countersunk, it was time to start prepping things for primer and paint. In preparation for primer, each part needed to be given a slight scuff to enable the paint to stick adequately. It isn’t necessary to go over the entire thing with sandpaper, and doing so might actually blunt some of your sharper details in the casting. The goal here was to knock any sort of shine off and have a piece with a uniform dullness to it that shows the surface has a slight roughness to it.
After more hours of sanding, priming, filling, sculpting, molding casting, cutting and drilling than I care to count, it was finally time to get some color onto the Needler. Some parts of the Needler were very easy to paint and only required the application of a single color. The grip, rear vents, lower handle attachment, and “barrel” (for lack of a better term) are mostly single color with a few accents here and there. The base coat of paint was done with Testor’s Buffable Metalizer lacquer, in magnesium (the lighter silver) and gunmetal (the darker). Accents and highlights to these parts were applied later on with brush paints.
The lower casing on the Needler has a padded-looking grip with a dark blue pebbled texture covering its surface, so I used Rustoleum “Multicolored Textured” spraypaint.
That iconic purple outer shell was a little trickier. The technique I settled on for creating the subtle hexagon pattern on the surface of the purple parts required a lot of thin passes of translucent paint to get a color-shift effect, and I found the best way to do this was over a coat of bright silver. After the two base coats had fully cured, I set up my laser cutter to trim out a large hexagon paint mask out of stencil vinyl.
Since the large surface area and compound curve of the purple sections meant getting the pattern to cover the entire surface seamlessly would be nigh impossible, the pattern was simulated by cutting various shapes of hexagon mask and applying them across the surface of the gun in the same facing direction
When these areas were painted, I feathered out the purple color at the edges of the paint masks so the seams wouldn’t be apparent. The purple used here was an enamel pearlescent clearcoat. When the rest of the part is painted with the purple clear, the areas of the casings without hex patterns blend into one another, while the masked off areas appear darker, leaving the negative space brighter due to the silver basecoat. I also used a little bit of a metallic dark blue, thinned out with some enamel clearcoat, to give the purple a bit of a color shift around the sharper edges and corners. This isn’t true “color shifting” paint, but the gradient of purple and blue across the surface does mimic the effect pretty well. And once these parts set for two days, I treated them with four coats of enamel clear--thin passes, five minutes between each coat.
After all the prop parts were basecoated, shiny and new, they needed a little bit of faux history infused into them to complete the transformation from plastic to replica. One part storytelling and one part fakery, this is the process known as weathering.
Back when I first started making props, the weathering process mostly involved smearing black and brown paint over the surface of something. While I still do that, there are a few steps and refinements I’ve learned along the way which have made my final paintjobs more realistic. This includes using a mix of colors besides brown and black to create the look of dirt and grime, and the judicious use of wet paper towels to create random textures. I go in-depth into each weathering technique here.
Halo takes place over a variety of environments, but for this prop I wanted the Needler to look like it had lived aboard a ship for the greater part of its life, then been deployed to one of the more forested areas of the ring. The brown areas should be dark to imitate mud or fine rich soil that had been cleaned away over time. When weathering a piece, consider where grime and gunk will build up over time. Most typically, in the creases and recessed areas.
Once the base weathering was complete, the final step (and my personal favorite) was drybrushing. Drybrushing in this case was the process of using silver paint on higher edges of a prop to simulate scuffed paint and the metal areas beneath. This is another process where you’ll need to consider the life and utility of the item you’re creating; a pistol would have a lot of scuffs around the trigger, trigger guard, magazine well, safety, ejection port, etc. Areas that would be handled often or would be in danger of contacting an abrasive surface when the weapon is set down should show signs of wear and tear.
Weathering should continue after you’ve assembled your prop. Intersections between components will need another pass of dirt and grime, and you might notice certain protrusions that need a bit of drybrushing as well.
A Project Completed
The Volpin Project is done!
It's a very fortunate artist who gets to select the works they are commissioned to build, and I can't thank the Tested guys enough for sponsoring this project. The Needler is something I've wanted to bring out into the real world for a very long time now, and I hope the articles from the project help you to bring your own creation to life as well.
Photography by Norman Chan and Harrison Krix |
The four sides agreed last month that state company Turkmengaz would lead the consortium for the $10-billion project
ASHGABAT: Turkmenistan has begun work on the ambitious 1,800-kilometre-long pipeline carrying gas from the former Soviet state to India, Pakistan and Afghanistan, state media reported Friday.
“Specialists of the Institute of Oil and Gas in the ‘Turkmengaz’ state corporation have started engineering and surveying work on the route for the future Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline,” state newspaper Neutral Turkmenistan reported, adding that the construction of the pipeline itself would begin in December.
The four countries have long planned the ambitious project to meet growing energy needs, but administrative issues and unrest in Afghanistan have so far delayed its realisation.
The four sides agreed last month that state company Turkmengaz would lead the consortium for the $10-billion project, although foreign commercial partners are also expected to participate.
Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov said last month that Japanese and Korean companies had expressed interest in investing into TAPI and has invited Turkish companies to join the bidding process.
International energy majors Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Total had been rumoured to be interested in the project but are no longer thought to be contenders for the contract.
TAPI is expected to ship up to 33 billion cubic metres (bcm) of gas annually starting in 2018, most of which will be absorbed by India and Pakistan. The project is key for ex-Soviet Turkmenistan, whose economy is almost entirely hydrocarbon-based and heavily dependent on China, which accounts for over 75 per cent of its gas sales.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 5th, 2015.
Read full story |
New Hampshire screamo vets Old Gray have returned from a three-year hiatus with Slow Burn , their first album since 2013's An Autobiography . So far, the trio has shared two tracks from the LP, due out December 9 via frontman (and Sorority Noise mastermind) Cameron Boucher's Flower Girl label: the short, sweet "Blunt Trauma," and the more nuanced "Everything Is in Your Hands." And there's more where that came from.
Recently, Old Gray stopped by the Little Elephant recording studio in Toledo, Ohio to perform an intimate live set comprised of three tracks from Slow Burn . In addition to "Blunt Trauma," the trio tore through "Razor Blade" and "Communion," two heretofore unheard rippers off the upcoming album. Check out their riotous performance below, and scroll down for a kickass poster detailing their brief tour, which kicks off next month.
Old Gray's new album Slow Burn hits shelves December 9 via Flower Girl Records, (Dog Knights Productions in the U.K.) Pre-order here — Brits, nab it here .
"BLUNT TRAUMA"
"COMMUNION"
"RAZOR BLADE" |
In a boost for Singapore's food security, local company Apollo Aquaculture Group will be setting up a high-tech farm in Brunei in a joint venture.
Mr Eric Ng, 44, group chief executive officer of Apollo Aquaculture Group, said the vertical fish-farming system will be remotely controlled and monitored from Apollo Aqua- culture's farm in Singapore.
With underwater sensors to measure parameters like temperature and salinity, the need for manpower is reduced and workers can respond to emergencies quickly, he said.
Noting that the yearly output of fish is eventually expected to reach 5,000 tonnes per year, Mr Ng said the farm will produce fish for consumption, such as groupers, as well as ornamental fish.
The joint venture between Apollo Aquaculture and a Bruneian partner - KR Apollo - was announced yesterday at a groundbreaking ceremony at the new farm in Brunei.
Minister of State for National Development and Trade and Industry Koh Poh Koon and Bruneian Minister of Primary Resources and Tourism Ali Apong attended the event.
In his speech, Dr Koh said Singapore is always looking to strengthen its food security by importing from a variety of sources.
He said: "Now, we have a vibrant farming sector, but as you can all understand, there are very obvious space constraints in Singapore.
"Brunei, on the other hand, is looking to diversify its economy, and agriculture is a potentially lucrative sector. One can see the potential for collaboration and sharing of know-how."
Mr Ng's decision to venture into Brunei was partly because his farm is one of 62 in Lim Chu Kang that will see their leases expire in 2019.
"Land is very scarce here. Brunei is different - they have abundant land and resources," said Mr Ng.
"By setting up a farm in Brunei, it also ensures that we have a backup in case anything happens to our farm here," he added.
Professor Paul Teng, adjunct senior fellow in food security in the Centre for Non-Traditional Security Studies at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, said any additional imported food source would increase Singapore's resilience.
However, he added that the cost effectiveness of importing seafood from Brunei remains to be seen.
"It would probably still cost less to import seafood from Peninsular Malaysia and Indonesia," he added.
Last year, Singapore imported fresh and frozen fish from about 80 countries, including Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Denmark and Senegal. There were no Brunei imports.
Past imports of fish from Brunei were minimal, said the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority.
Local fish farmers produced 4,900 tonnes of fish last year, accounting for about 10 per cent of fresh (live and chilled) fish eaten here.
Mr Ng hopes the joint venture will be a positive example for local farms to follow.
He said: "The traditional method for fish farming has never changed. It's very tough work. But with technology, the possibilites are endless." |
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Until then, feel free to read my previous posts about the incredible places I explored on my Epic Rust Belt Road Trip
Across a sprawling 13,000-acre stretch of land lies the scattered remains of a World War II era Ammunition factory. The crumbling industrial buildings and subterranean bunkers of Kingsbury Ordnance Plant punctuate grids of cracked pavement surrounded by farm fields and forestland. The gears of the wartime industry that lifted America from the Great Depression and fueled the Allied victory over the Axis have long since ground to a halt.After an incredible day in Gary, Indiana exploring the abandoned Palace Theater City Methodist Church and other awesome abandoned places , I set out to see the ruins of Kingsbury Ordnance Plant.I stopped at a gas station just outside the city of La Porte. In an icy tone, the cashier asked for my credit card and drivers license to hold while I pumped my gas. I was surprised, but shrugged it off and filled up my tank. When I came back in, she was all smiles and explained that she was being extra careful because she'd never seen me before. The other cashier asked why I was visiting La Porte of all places and then started dancing around behind the counter. We shared a laugh and I got back on the road.The remains of Kingsbury Ordnance Plant are spread out over a huge rural area with a small population, so I doubted I would run into anyone during my visit. I was very wrong.Some of the old buildings have been sold to private companies. A security guard working for a chemical company approached me to make sure I wasn't snapping photos of the plant. I assured him I was only there to look at the historic buildings and he seemed satisfied. Still I decided to leave the area so I wouldn't cause undue concern.Navigating the old ammunition factory was challenging because there are no signs to indicate what or where anything is. I relied mostly on satellite images.I found an area where dozens of identical bunkers lay spaced out in rows like houses in a subdivision. Grass covered the sloped roofs and trees grew atop many of them. They seemed to be empty, but I couldn't be sure. It would have taken a very long time to peek inside each of them to find out.Some of Kingsbury's old structures were fenced off or sealed up.Others had collapsed to little more than foundations with rows of bare concrete walls.I wandered around, occasionally managing to get a peek inside.A few buildings still contained relics left behind when the plant closed.As I made my way back to the car, a man in a white pickup pulled over and asked if I was parked nearby. He told me that a guy who was leasing the property had called the cops because he didn't recognize my car.Police had already arrived at my car by the time I got there. I told them I was only there to take pictures of the old buildings and didn't mean to cause any trouble. Apparently I had driven past a No Trespassing sign without realizing it. After running my license and seeing that I had a clean record, the police said I was free to go. I apologized for the inconvenience and headed back out on the road.Needless to say, if you're thinking about exploring Kingsbury Ordnance plant, keep an eye out for No Trespassing signs. It's also be a good idea to contact local law enforcement and ask which areas are okay to explore. They will appreciate it.After France fell to Hitler's forces in 1940, the US began gearing up for war. The Department of War commissioned the construction of 73 ammunition manufacturing facilities across the United States.LaPorte County, Indiana was deemed a prime location because the land was relatively flat and had plentiful well water. It was far enough inland to avoid enemy attacks, but well positioned near highways and railroads so that product could be easily transported to the East and West coasts. The area was also far enough from any major city that an accidental explosion was unlikely to cause much harm.Buildings were spaced apart so that if an explosion did occur, the surrounding structures would not be damaged. Fortunately, there were never any major accidents.Two hundred and fifty families had to relocate to make room for the ordnance plant. They were given 30 days notice and paid what was deemed fair value for their land.The government purchased a total of 13,454 acres and quickly began construction.Workers were recruited from the surrounding areas. Many came from the city of Gary because Kingsbury offered higher wages than workers typically earned at US Steel.To accommodate an expected 10,000 workers in a community that only had a population of 16,000, The War Department built thousands of homes, trailers and dormitories just outside the factory. The new settlement was dubbed Kingsford Heights.By May of 1942, employment at Kingsbury Ordnance Plant had swelled to a high of 20,785, about half of whom were women. For many it was their first job outside of the home.Inspired by Rosie the Riveter, the plant adopted "Tillie the TNT Girl" as a mascot.Kingsbury closed at the end of World War II, but reopened in 1951 after the US entered the Korean War. It ceased operations permanently in 1959.A portion of the land has been converted into Kingsbury State Fish and Wildlife Area and another segment is now Kingsbury Industrial Park.Redevelopment of the area has been slow due to the fact that waste from the ammunition plant still exists on the land and cleanup is expensive.Future plans include a new rail yard, the restoration of old railroad tracks and extension of existing lines. The railway will connect Kingsbury with facilities in Florida and across the Midwest, facilitating the distribution of produce and other farm goods. In March 2017, the LaPorte County government took control of the project with the hope of bringing in new developers.From Kingsbury, I made my way to Niles, Michigan to see an old hydroelectric dam that wouldn't be around for much longer.Thank you for checking out this article. If you enjoyed it, please share it on Facebook I have many more photos of Kingsbury Ordnance Plant than I was able to include here. I'll be sharing them on social media, so please follow the links below if you'd like to see more of this incredible abandoned place.Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/placesthatwere Instagram: http://instagram.com/theplacesthatwere Twitter: https://twitter.com/placesthatwere/ Tumblr: http://placesthatwere.tumblr.com/ Google+: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+JimSullivanPlacesThatWere/posts EyeEm: https://www.eyeem.com/u/placesthatwere Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/jimplicit 500px: https://500px.com/placesthatwere Thank you! |
Social media users mocked Farage’s post that shows him striding up to the broadcaster’s London HQ
Nigel Farage ridiculed over video of him delivering letter to BBC
Nigel Farage has been roundly derided on social media for posting a video of himself marching up to the doors of the BBC’s Broadcasting House in London brandishing a letter of complaint.
Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) Delivering my letter of complaint to the BBC Director-General yesterday. pic.twitter.com/TerWF4Z2dO
Internet users were quick to see the funny side of the video.
Sharon Horgan (@SharonHorgan) Postman Twat https://t.co/zAZ9x0GzEd
Nathan O'Hagan (@NathanOHagan) Footage of @Nigel_Farage delivering his letter of complaint to the BBC. pic.twitter.com/myrVsn0MvV
Justin Deegan (@JustinDeeganEsq) The BBC Director-General receiving your victimhood application form. pic.twitter.com/u51OS9n18V
Dr Congo (@congo_doc) Nigel Farage's letter of complaint to the BBC Director-General: pic.twitter.com/wK8STpQ5Hb
Andy Greenwood (@AndyG001) Really hope that on BBC Question Time this week one of the panel is that letter from Nigel Farage sat on a chair #bbcqt
And posing holding a piece of paper always goes badly for politicians when social media users are armed with Photoshop.
Adam Bienkov (@AdamBienkov) It would be a real shame if Nigel Farage's very important protest was ruined by photoshoppers. pic.twitter.com/74gAdkC9HQ
Craig (@Eclectic_otter) "Delivering my letter of complaint to the BBC Director-General yesterday" pic.twitter.com/Y8xjWI0lCR
People repeated Farage’s phrase “Delivering my letter of complaint to the director-general of the BBC” on Tuesday, accompanying it with a range of different videos.
Jason Mcintyre (@KeefFan) "Delivering my letter of complaint to the BBC Director-General yesterday." pic.twitter.com/JH0V2fHngw
Ian MacGilp (@IanMacGilp) "Delivering my letter of complaint to the BBC Director-General yesterday" pic.twitter.com/8xLCLXN8rM
Matthew Craft (@matthewcraft78) Delivering my letter of complaint to the BBC Director-General yesterday pic.twitter.com/B4DBXd5Tse
Matt Leys (@mattleys) Delivering my letter of complaint to the BBC Director-General yesterday. pic.twitter.com/HybxD3mr2n
Al F (@MarkoftheRennie) "Delivering my letter of complaint to the BBC Director-General yesterday." pic.twitter.com/25yYBglZRz
Farage’s complaint to the BBC dates back to reporting in the aftermath of the death of Polish man Arkadiusz Jozwik in Harlow in 2016, which sparked fears of a wave of Brexit hate crime.
In an interview with BBC reporter John Sweeney at the time, one local resident claimed that Farage had “blood on his hands”. The former Ukip leader has described this as a ‘slur’ that has caused his family misery.
Speaking on his LBC radio show, Farage said: “I want an apology and if I don’t get one then I think I’ll be compelled next year to feel why should I pay the licence fee.”
In response to Farage’s claim, a BBC Spokesperson said:
“The BBC’s reporting reflected, like other media, that racial motivation was a line of inquiry the police were looking at and our coverage also featured vox-pops giving differing views including anti-social behaviour as a possibility.”
Eddie Robson (@EddieRobson) Farage is demanding the BBC apologise over a vox pop. He's not so keen on the voice of the people when it says he's an arsehole, is he?
Farage famously described the leave victory in the EU referendum as being achieved “without a single bullet being fired”, despite the murder of MP Jo Cox by far-right terrorist Thomas Mair taking place only days earlier. |
You might hate your apartment, but at least your landlord can’t literally eat you alive. Deep in the heart of Texas, one species of blind snake is living inches below its feathered predator. That can’t be a good idea, right?
Yesterday, Reddit user birdsbirdsbirdsbirds shared a piece of zoological trivia with the Today I Learned community all about—you guessed it—birds.
Birdsbirdsbirdsbirds wrote, “[Today I learned] some owls keep blind snakes in their nests as helpful associates, reducing the abundance of nest parasites.”
Although it was news to birdsbirdsbirdsbirds, scientists actually discovered this curious interspecies friendship about 40 years ago.
In 1975, two biologists from Baylor University found that some eastern screech owls endemic to central Texas were sharing their nests with blind snakes—a surprising observation because the snakes should be the owls’ prey.
In fact, aside from a few random insects, Texas blind snakes were the only living prey the biologists had ever seen in the birds’ nests, making this interspecies cohabitation even more remarkable.
For scale, here is the flying Furby ornithologists call the “eastern screech owl”:
And here is the tiny, puce-colored earthworm herpetologists call the “Texas blind snake”:
The researchers—F. R. Gehlbach and R. S. Baldridge—formulated their study after watching “four adult screech owls delivering a live blind snake to its nestlings” and seeing that “all snakes were found alive in the nests the next day.”
By contrast, this is the normal level of hospitality these owls show their serpentine guests:
“Like most raptorial birds, eastern screech owls kill and usually decapitate vertebrate prey before bringing it to the nests. Reptilian prey often dangles from the bill of adult screech owls upon delivery to a nest …”
Of course, the owls still hauled the Texas blind snakes through the air to move them to the nests, but their delivery method seemed gentler. Gehlbach and Baldridge observed that the snakes “were coiled about the bills of the owls that carried them.”
If you’re not impressed by the possibility of owls showing self-restraint with snakes, just imagine the dogs from Lady and the Tramp visiting Tony’s Italian restaurant, ordering a plate of spaghetti, wrapping the noodles around their snouts, walking across town (still holding that same spaghetti), dropping the spaghetti off in the bed of their newborn puppies, and having none of the dogs eat any of the spaghetti.
The phenomenon was—as those in the scientific community say—”weird.” So the biologists had to investigate.
Gehlbach and Baldridge studied 77 eastern screech owl nests, 14 of which (approximately 18 percent) harbored blind snakes. Most nests had just one reptilian resident, though one nest housed 15 snakes over the course of the study (at which point you can’t really call it an owl’s nest so much as a bed-and-breakfast for blind snakes).
Eighty-nine percent of the snakes the owls brought back to their nests stayed alive and well. Four of the 35 total snakes weren’t so lucky.
But before you give owls credit for—as those in the scientific community say—”not eating the spaghetti,” Gehlbach notes that all of the snakes were probably intended as food.
As he writes in his book The Eastern Screech Owl, “These snakes are delivered as food but mostly uninjured, so they burrow in nest debris … there is no evidence that stocking live blind snakes in nests is anything more than accidental.”
According to the biologist, the snakes remained uneaten because of their “writhing defensive behavior and smooth cylindrical body, smeared with repellent secretions.”
(Before he studied owls, Gehlbach was actually on the team of experts studying blind snakes’ “anal gland” secretions. So he knows his shit.)
Even though the owls failed to eat the snakes, the reptiles proved incredibly useful to the birds’ reproductive fitness once they were transported to the nests because the snakes fed on insects that would otherwise steal the owls’ stored foods.
Gehlbach notes in his book that everything from rats to insect carcasses “slowly disappeared under the onslaught of acrobat ants, fly maggots, and other decomposers.” He concludes that the effects “could be severe, if Texas blind snakes did not reduce the numbers of at least some insect competitors …”
The most important creatures the snakes eradicate are soft-bodied insect larvae, which would otherwise antagonize the baby owls as parasites—or as competition for their food.
This larval consumption has a direct positive impact on the health of the baby owls, as Gehlbach and Baldridge describe in their study:
“… nestlings with live-in blind snakes grow faster and experience lower mortality than same-season broods lacking snakes.”
In effect, the snakes serve as in-nest neonatologists, making the owlets healthier by keeping their nurseries pest-free.
And just think—the adult owls wanted to eat these baby-saving miracle snakes. What a hoot. |
Two thieves either didn’t notice they were on camera -- or didn’t care -- when they stole an expensive drone from a hobby shop.
“We have the ‘smile you’re on camera’ right up by the register – it’s probably one of the first things you see when you walk through the door,” said Andrew Jones, the owner of the Remote Control Hobbies franchise on East Smoky Hill Rd.
The two thieves spent about five minutes browsing the store and checking out remote control cars, before they grabbed three boxes of drones near the front door and bolted out of the store.
The suspects in an Aurora drone left
“This is my livelihood,” Jones said. “This is how I survive. This is how I put food on the table and they think it’s okay to take that from me.”
On their way to a getaway car parked nearby, the thieves dropped one box containing a Phantom 3 drone. But they got away with a Phantom 4 drone. Luckily, the other box was empty.
A clerk who chased the pair out of the store said they got away in a gold-colored Honda Accord with temporary tags.
Anyone with information should contact the Aurora Police Department dispatch at 303-627-3100 or you can also contact the Metro Denver Crime Stoppers at 720-913-STOP (7867).
Copyright 2016 KUSA |
Every year, more than 7 million young people enter colleges across mainland China. Later, nearly 10 percent of them will continue their studies in graduate school. While at university, both undergraduate and graduate students alike must take compulsory classes on political and ideological theory.
In the minds of many Westerners, the very fact that Chinese students take obligatory Marxism classes is tantamount to brainwashing — but that’s a debate for another day. As a professor of Marxism, my primary concern is that the classes are not always interesting to students. In recent years, nearly everything about these courses, from their format to their content, has undergone radical change. Still, reforming the dull, dry, and didactic traditional teaching methods is no easy task.
The courses have undergone numerous changes since 1949. At present, undergraduates are required to take four such classes: Basic Principles of Marxism; Introduction to Mao Zedong Thought and Socialism With Chinese Characteristics; Modern Chinese History; and Ideological and Moral Cultivation and Basics of Law. Master’s students, meanwhile, take a course titled “Socialism With Chinese Characteristics: Theory and Practice,” and doctoral students take one called “Chinese Marxism and the Contemporary World.” In addition, there are several electives available to students seeking a more comprehensive overview of the topic.
At the beginning of this year, the minister of education, Chen Baosheng, admitted that courses in Marxism “aren’t appealing and suffer from a lack of focus.” In his view, the low engagement of political and ideological theory courses comes down to the fact that “the content is not suited to [students’] needs. The formula used in these courses is outdated, their methods are crude, and their packaging isn’t very fashionable.”
My university is trying to challenge the broadly negative perception of political ideology classes. As teachers, we encourage students to discuss, ask questions about, and reflect on hot-button issues related to modern China and the rest of the world. To stimulate debate, we give students questionnaires designed to help us understand the issues they find interesting. We then work to tie these issues back into Marxism and socialism with Chinese characteristics.
While the USSR may have broken up nearly three decades ago, its failure has remained a consistent topic of reflection within Chinese governmental and intellectual circles. - Xiao Wei, professor
Our teachers are also enthusiastically engaged in educating students in how to respond rationally to sensitive issues, such as slowing economic growth and the quality of China’s economic development, environmental management, Party leadership, and rule of law. Often, our discussions touch on sensitive political issues, such as Hong Kong’s Occupy Central movement and even the country’s more tumultuous events since ushering in the reform era in the late 1970s.
Our approach has led to many lively discussions between teachers and students and has fostered a dynamic classroom atmosphere. We hope that through such good-natured interactions, we can lead students to accept official stances on mainstream values, rather than compel them to mechanically recite whatever factoids are needed to pass a test.
Naturally, if we want to reason with our students or move them emotionally, then we teachers must have solid academic backgrounds, expansive worldviews, and a thorough training in oration. To this end, we recruit professors from various fields across the humanities and social sciences, almost all of whom have experience of overseas study or international exchange. Their courses cover more than just Marxist authors, with students and teachers embarking on joint explorations of the works of eclectic philosophers and economists like John Rawls, Amartya Sen, Hannah Arendt, and even modern thinkers like Thomas Piketty.
Many pedagogical changes draw on the lessons China has learned from the collapse — both economic and ideological — of the Soviet Union. While the USSR may have broken up nearly three decades ago, its failure has remained a consistent topic of reflection within Chinese governmental and intellectual circles. The reasons for the Soviet collapse are multifaceted and complex, but one of them was surely its ideological failure.
Soviet ideological education was stiflingly doctrinaire, divorced from reality, out of step with the times, and disconnected from the masses. It turned a blind eye to the challenges, issues, and age-old abuses inherent in real life. This bred aversion to official ideology, especially within the ranks of intellectuals and young students. Instead, the words and ideas of the regime’s opponents were spread privately, winning sympathy and resonating with the common people.
We must adopt an ‘à la carte’ approach when it comes to absorbing the best products from ancient and modern times, as well as from China and abroad. - Xiao Wei, professor
Importantly, university-level values education is increasingly starting to emphasize the ability to make individual decisions. As Chinese society has become more open, all kinds of ideological trends have rushed in. Chinese universities must train a generation of young students capable of deciding for themselves which of these outside concepts have value, rather than just passively accepting any new idea they run into.
Values education is also increasingly focused on the notion of inclusivity. Given China’s rapid social development, various ideas have room to coexist. Out of this a consensus will emerge, one that will make use of each idea’s strengths. One of Chairman Mao’s most well-known maxims was: “Make the past serve the present and the foreign serve China.” Today, this means adopting an à la carte approach when it comes to absorbing the best products from ancient and modern times, as well as from China and abroad. And when young people hold divergent views, we should use reason to win them over.
Increasingly, our classes are also embodying centrist political attitudes. In guiding the development of a values system, we must neither give up our core principles — specifically, the Communist Party’s leadership and socialism with Chinese characteristics — nor respond to new ideas with suspicion and fear. Yet we must also be on guard against disturbances caused by extremist views, such as an overly close embrace of Western modes of governance or a return to the chaos of the Cultural Revolution.
Finally, values education increasingly requires innovation, something the government has consistently emphasized since the beginning of the reform era in 1978. Many Chinese now believe rare development opportunities cannot be allowed to slip through our fingers. In a globalized and interconnected era, values education cannot remain stuck in the past. Whether in the dissemination of ideas, the system of discourse, or the use of technology, we must clear out the old ways to make room for the new. Only then can we make values education something young people actually look forward to.
Translator: Kilian O’Donnell; editors: Lu Hua and Matthew Walsh.
(Header image: A portrait of Karl Marx is displayed at an exhibition in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, Oct. 15, 2014. Long Wei/VCG) |
A woman in Pennsylvania was extremely frustrated with her boyfriend after he refused to have sex with her, so, naturally, she attacked him. Then when he tried to escape to call 911, she chased him down the street without her pants on.
Heather Hayes, 24, faces several charges after she followed her boyfriend to a Lansford Turkey Hill convenience store while wearing no bottoms. She is being charged with indecent exposure, simple assault, open lewdness and harassment.
Authorities were called to the scene when her boyfriend alerted them of what was going on after he arrived at the convenience store.
Officer Jeffrey Ohl came to the store and saw Hayes standing by a trashcan, nude except for a shirt. He put her in the backseat of his police cruiser and asked her what happened.
She told him that she was arguing with her boyfriend, Eric Zuber, after he refused to have sex with her.
Zuber told the officer that they were at his house when she started attacking him. She started slapping and punching him on his head and back, but then escalated to biting him, grabbing and twisting his testicles.
Zuber fled to the convenience store for safety and called authorities from there. Hayes followed him and screamed at him the entire way there and hit him with her house keys.
Hayes told the officer that Zuber spent the past two days playing Xbox with his friends and hadn’t paid attention to her.
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The Grenfell fire: Class politics versus identity politics
By Robert Stevens and Laura Tiernan
17 July 2017
The most striking feature of the response from survivors of the Grenfell Tower fire and by local residents is the near universal understanding that this was a crime committed by the ruling class against the working class.
In the days and weeks after the fire, workers and young people of all nationalities, skin colours and religions have united to help victims and provide food, clothing, shelter and other support in the face of government inaction, callousness and indifference.
Last week, the police and local council called a public meeting at St Clements Church in yet another attempt to fob off local residents’ demands that arrests be made. Outside the meeting, one resident summed up the anger: “There is no connection between the upper class and working class whatsoever, and that divide is getting bigger and bigger, and in Kensington and Chelsea it’s the biggest divide you’ll ever see.”
This class approach is anathema to the various proponents of identity politics, who have for decades sought to filter every issue of British society through the prism of race, religion, gender and sexuality. Their deliberate effort to conceal the essential class questions and sow divisions within the working class while furthering their own careers is exemplified by their response to Grenfell.
Prime Minister Theresa May was forced to call a public inquiry in the face of widespread public anger at the massive loss of life. However, its purpose is to allow the Conservative government—in the time-honoured tradition of the British ruling elite—to mount a cover-up and ensure that those responsible evade justice. Appointed to lead the inquiry is the former High Court judge, Sir Martin Moore-Bick, who made clear that no serious investigation will be forthcoming when he stated: “I’ve been asked to undertake this inquiry on the basis that it would be pretty well limited to the problems surrounding the start of the fire and its rapid development, in order to make recommendations as to how this sort of thing can be prevented in the future.”
May’s public inquiry and its limited terms of reference have been widely denounced by Grenfell survivors and residents of the Lancaster West housing estate.
Moore-Bick’s record in the judicial sanctioning of social cleansing policies means he is part of the very establishment whose assault on social housing tenants produced the fire that claimed so many lives. However, according to the BME [Black Minority Ethnic] Lawyers4Grenfell, an umbrella group that includes among others the Association of Muslim Lawyers, the Society of Black Lawyers, Operation Black Vote, NHS BME Network and Society of Asian Lawyers, a central problem with May’s inquiry is Moore-Bick’s skin colour.
The group has called on May to remove him and appoint someone with a background representing the “diverse” local population. In a press release issued by BMELawyers4Grenfell on July 3, Peter Herbert, Chair of the Society of Black Lawyers stated, “This government is well aware that the Grenfell community has lost confidence in the white male middle class model but continues to impose this in appointing a Chair who has little or no personal or professional insight into the cultural, religious, and ethnic diversity represented by the Grenfell community.”
BMELawyers4Grenfell were instrumental in arranging the Grenfell Tower meeting called by Labour’s Shadow Home Secretary, Diane Abbott, on 29 June. The meeting was addressed by Abbott and David Lammy, two of Labour’s most prominent black MPs, along with local Labour MP Emma Coad Dent, whose constituency includes Grenfell Tower, and shadow Justice Minister Richard Burgon.
One hundred and fifty survivors attended the meeting, and BMELawyers4Grenfell reported that “survivors, residents, family members and supporters denounced the abject failure of the Government and the local authority to provide answers, their repeated misinformation regarding rehousing of residents and the alleged support provided, and discussed a list of demands that remain unmet.”
The overarching focus on race and religion, however, provided Abbott and Lammy with an opportunity to conceal the rotten political role of the Labour Party in helping to create the appalling social conditions that led to Grenfell—through its embrace of austerity and privatisation—as well as to aid party leader Jeremy Corbyn in his attempts to lend credence to May’s bogus inquiry.
First, the meeting’s recommendations became the basis for Corbyn sending a letter to May on how the inquiry could be reconfigured to lend it a much-needed veneer of credibility. Second, the press release suggested that the best way to lend the inquiry credibility was to incorporate various BME advocates into its proceedings.
The press release cites Ranjit Sond, President of the Society of Asian Lawyers, as insisting, “It must be noted that the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry and the Scarman Report only managed to build the confidence of the local community by conducting a detailed consultation sitting as they did with a diverse panel of advisers who helped them develop the trust of the victims and survivors. The appointment of a diverse panel of experts that understands not only the surrounding technical matters, but the need of the local community is essential to the success of this Inquiry” [emphasis added].
To underscore the message that a more diverse racial mix to the proceedings would help sell the inquiry to a sceptical and hostile population, Lammy told Sky News that Moore-Bick, “is a white, upper-middle class man… It is a shame we couldn’t find a woman to lead this inquiry or indeed an ethnic minority to lead the inquiry in 2017.”
The sole purpose of such rhetoric is to conceal the fact that May’s inquiry, whatever the gender or ethnic background of the judge leading it, will be a political whitewash.
Within hours of the fire, and with only a small number of the dead identified, major efforts were already being made to make racism the central issue in the Grenfell tragedy. On June 15, the day after the fire, Skylar Baker-Jordan, Contributing Editor of Gay UK Magazine, wrote an article for the UK edition of the Huffington Post, set up by Arianna Huffington (estimated wealth $35 million).
Baker-Jordan wrote, “Most of those who perished, or who lost everything in the flames, were Black and Minority Ethnic people,” before having to acknowledge “and they were all poor (the nature of living on a council estate).”
Addressing the social cleansing in London, he continued this theme saying such policies meant the “poor (who are often, though not always, BME) are pushed out of quality housing in favour of regenerating the city for affluent and largely white renters and buyers.”
After stating that there are “loads of poor white people too,” he continued, “But studies have shown that whilst 20% of white people are low income, this number increases for ethnic minorities.”
Baker-Jordan insisted, “In the case of Grenfell Tower, we can’t ignore the presence of so many poor BME people,” asserting that it confirms “the local government and parliament cares more about rich white people than poor Black and Brown people,” etc., etc.
All of which is to conceal the fundamental class divide.
In central London, around half of all housing, much of it luxury apartments and town houses, is owned by overseas investors, many of them absentee. Kensington and Chelsea Council could not care less what the colour of the skin of these super-rich residents is, or whether the poor are white, black or Asian.
Baker-Jordan’s piece was then cited in the Guardian on July 6 by Kevin Gulliver, a leading identity politics advocate. His article was headlined, “Britain’s housing crisis is racist—we need to talk about it.” It states that 36 percent of people accepted as statutorily homeless in England during 2016-17 “were from a BME background.”
While this is a higher proportion than the presence of ethnic minorities in the general population, the most basic fact to be drawn from this statistic is that 64 percent of those accepted as homeless—almost two thirds—are not BME and that homelessness hits the working class and poor of whatever ethnic background.
Gulliver continues, “What is surprising is how little this disproportionate level of housing need on racial grounds has registered in the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire, where the majority of residents were from a BME background.”
He notes favourably the proliferation of BME community-controlled housing associations since 1986, which “continue to play a small but crucial role in offering alternative housing solutions to BME communities.”
However, he asserts, “despite these advances, race remains a defining characteristic in the nation’s housing system.”
The attempt to portray the housing crisis as the product of racism is reactionary and divisive. The lack of decent, affordable social housing for the working class is the result not of skin colour, but of the stranglehold of the capitalist class over society’s resources.
But for those who promote identity politics over class, real material interests are at stake. Among the central preoccupations of the upper middle-class layers who utilise issues of race and gender—regardless of whether they themselves are black or white, male or female—are the rewards to be made from being part of this milieu.
BME Housing organisations were initiated under the Thatcher government following the Brixton riots in 1981. A report handed down by Lord Scarman in November of that year recommended a series of measures, including the recruitment of ethnic minorities into the police force and other forms of “positive discrimination”. Today there are 70 BME Housing organisations nationally. Yet the housing crisis for every section of the working class is worse than ever.
Gulliver is the Director of the Human City Institute (HCI), one of the compilers of a June 2017 publication of BMENational—the representative body for BME housing organisations. The Human City Institute web site notes, “Since HCI was re-shaped as a research charity and think-tank in 2008, it has undertaken work valued at more than £1.5m in cash and ‘in kind’, with income from sponsors, grant-making trusts, public bodies and sales.”
Their document, “Deep Roots, Diverse Communities, Dedicated Service: The Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) Housing Sector’s Offer,” boasts:
“Black and Minority (BME) housing sector is a small but crucial and influential element in the make-up of the housing market in England. It houses almost 250,000 people in 66,000 homes, representing about 3% of the social housing stock.” It adds, “The sector has been active for more than three decades, supported by governments of all political stripes...”
The report continues, noting that the “BME housing sector works with more than 1,000 public, private and third sector partners to provide housing, for community investment and to promote community cohesion.” These partnerships, it states, “are most frequent in Greater London, where forty-three BME housing organisations of all shapes and sizes manage 20,650 homes.”
Currently, 70 associations manage “66,000 homes, with an estimated annual turnover of £600m and controlling assets valued at around £1.8bn.”
Last October, Gulliver wrote on the 24housing web site, “Over the next ten years, the BME housing association-controlled stock could reasonably expect to expand by net 15,000 homes, including shared ownership and starter homes as well as social and affordable rent. This would see stock growth of about one quarter, or 2 to 3 per cent each year.”
Control over these assets means that involvement in such associations offers a very comfortable lifestyle—for some.
There are 3,500 people employed directly by the 70 associations—one for every 20 or so houses managed, with those at management level earning a tidy sum. One of the 70 organisations, Arawak Walton, boasts that it is the “largest independent black and minority ethnic (BME) Housing Association in the North West, with an asset base of around £57 million and turnover in the region of £5 million.” Employing 26 office staff, its accounts for the year ending March 2016 show that two of its full-time officers took home between £60,000 and £70,000, while another was paid between £90,000 and £100,000.
The BME sector has been supported by successive Conservative-led and Labour governments precisely because it pits BME workers against white workers in a scramble for an ever-dwindling stock of substandard social housing.
The demand that racial discrimination in housing is answered by policies based on “positive discrimination” or “affirmative action” only reinforces racial divisions and cuts across the necessary struggle for the provision of housing as social right for all. This demand, to be realised through a unified struggle and against the advocates of racial politics, is the answer the working class must give to the Grenfell Tower inferno.
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The only thing that could top today's epic market insanity and hilarity, would be that Corzine is himself about to be Corzined. Just released from Bloomberg:
And so we can now add perjury to felony embezzlement. Which means we now have to wait to find just which MF'er (and JPM'er) will be given a promise of untold millions if they only get Fab Tourre'd for a few years, and spend 5-7 in minimum security state prison instead of brave Jonny.
From Bloomberg:
Jon S. Corzine, MF Global Holding Ltd.’s chief executive officer, gave “direct instructions” to transfer $200 million from a customer fund account to meet an overdraft in one of the brokerage’s JPMorgan Chase & Co.
accounts in London, according to an e-mail sent by a firm executive.
Edith O’Brien, a treasurer for the firm, said in an e-mail sent the afternoon of Oct. 28, three days before the company collapsed, that the transfer of the funds was “Per JC’s direct instructions,” according to a copy of a memo drafted by congressional investigators and obtained by Bloomberg News.
O’Brien’s internal e-mail came as the New York-based broker found intraday credit lines limited by JPMorgan, the firm’s clearing bank as well as one of its custodian banks for segregated customer funds, according to the memo, which was prepared for a March 28 House Financial Services subcommittee hearing on the firm’s collapse. O’Brien is scheduled to testify after being subpoenaed this week.
“Over the course of that week, MF Global’s financial position deteriorated, but the firm represented to its regulators and self-regulatory organizations that its customers’segregated funds were safe,” said the memo, written by Financial Services Committee staff and sent to lawmakers.
Vinay Mahajan, global treasurer of MF Global Holdings, wrote an e-mail on Oct. 28 that said JPMorgan was “holding up vital business in the U.S. as a result” of the overdrawn account, which had to be “fully funded ASAP,” according to the memo.
O’Brien Letter
Barry Zubrow, JPMorgan’s chief risk officer, called Corzine to seek assurances that the funds belonged to MF Global and not customers. JPMorgan drafted a letter to be signed by O’Brien to ensure that MF Global was complying with rules requiring customers’ collateral to be segregated. The letter was never returned to JPMorgan, the memo said.
The money transferred came from a segregated customer account, according to congressional investigators. Segregated accounts can include customer money and excess company funds.
Corzine testified that he never intended a misuse of customer funds at MF Global, and that he doesn’t know where client funds went.
“I did not instruct anyone to lend customer funds to anyone,” Corzine told lawmakers in December.
Steven Goldberg, a spokesman for Corzine, declined immediate comment. |
Via Yves Smith, an important piece on “rescissions”: cases in which insurance companies retroactively cancel your health coverage.
The industry would have you believe that it’s a minor issue, because only a small fraction of the insured experience rescissions in any given year. But as the post points out, a small fraction of the insured experience a large share of medical expenses — and you can bet that rescissions are concentrated on the people with big medical bills. So half a percent, if that’s really true, is a large fraction of people who really need coverage.
I’d add that rescissions must be concentrated in the individual insurance market, since group coverage is, by law, not contingent on medical history. And the individual market is a small fraction of the total; again, this must mean that the phenomenon of insurers pulling your coverage when you get sick must be quite important indeed.
Of course, there’s also an alternative universe in which insurance companies would never, never treat their clients badly, because that would hurt their reputations. |
Tera Intezaar
Cast: Sunny Leone, Arbaaz Khan
Director: Raajeev Walia
Rating: 0/5
Oh I forgot, Sunny Leone exclaims with uncontrollable enthusiasm after seeing her portrait on Arbaaz’s tablet, “Tumne mujhe bina dekhe itni achchi tasveer kaise bana li (How did you draw such a beautiful picture without seeing me?). Err, shouldn’t you be worried about such a creepy situation?
There are some white collar thieves who want to steal Veer’s paintings even though he is a rookie. Don’t even ask about his paintings, because they may remind you of the first drawing you did in your childhood. Yes, that sun-mountain-river one. I don’t know why somebody would kill for such a mediocre painting! On the other hand, they should run away as fast as they can if they are indeed art collectors.
There onwards, Tera Intezaar changes into a bizarre ghost story. People get kidnapped, eloped, murdered. Oh my god, it sounds so better on paper. Then there are twists, more twists and some more twists till you lose the track, or twisted in the head.
There is a ghost-buster played by Sudha Chandran (Ramola Sikand!). She accepts, “Jis tarah se saari cheezein mujhe clear nazar nahi aa rahi hain waise hi tum bhi mujhe clear nazar nahi aa rahi ho (I can’t see you clearly as well as other things).” Well, ask us!
She also says, “Inme se aatma kaun si hai ye mujhe samajh nahi aa raha hai (I don’t understand which of these is a ghost?).”
It’s a collage of incredibly planned scenes. Consider this: A group of four hears a roaring sound inside a jungle and one of them says, “Ye aawaz kuch jaani pehchaani lag rahi hai, shayad sher ki hai (This sounds familiar, is that a tiger?)” Please consider playing Sherlock’s Indian counterpart. Will you?
In other scene, Sunny Leone invites some people on a business meeting to discuss about paintings and then breaks into a suggestive dance. They mustn’t have seen this coming. Maybe business with pleasure is their mantra in life. What do we know about art!
This review will be incomplete if I don’t tell you about the hanging mango. What exactly happens is that four people are running for their lives and enter a jungle. Suddenly one of them spots a mango and decides to eat it. The ghost can wait.
One of them takes a bite and starts talking to the next person. I am yet to figure out why he left the mango mid-air after putting his teeth into it. The mango stays there and after a while starts to stare at them. Trust me, you haven’t seen anything so surreal in recent times. I got goosebumps after realising that it’s only been 15 minutes into it.
From performing planchette to listening conversations via paintings, Tera Intezaar can entertain you at many levels. Just don’t doze off.
Interact with Rohit Vats at Twitter/@nawabjha
First Published: Dec 01, 2017 13:48 IST |
Attention! This news was published on the old version of the website. There may be some problems with news display in specific browser versions.
Assault Gliders Ascending
Fallschirmjäger (paratroopers) assaulting from a DFS-230 glider, 1943
“Revenge, at first though sweet, Bitter ere long back on itself recoils”
(John Milton, Paradise Lost).
History tells of many examples where desire for revenge has resulted in greater loss for the one enacting it. The Versailles Treaty is a perfect example and the mother of the Assault Glider and cause of the most unexpected military victory in history.
German aviation pioneer Marga von Etzdorf
receiving her pilot licence, 1927
The 1919 Versailles Treaty stipulated Germany could have no military aircraft whatsoever, however non-powered aircraft (gliders), were not specifically mentioned. Despite this, the German government was aware of the requirement for proficiency in aviation and so by 1922 establish a secret base in Lipetsk, Russia to train pilots; long before Hitler entered politics (the political situation was far different and more amicable in the 1920’s). This single base was far from adequate, so to expand flight training, glider clubs were established all over Germany, the world’s first was Rhön-Rossitten Gesellschaft (RRG). This glider program expanded so by the early 30’s it was teaching tens of thousands of Germans to fly, and it was only getting bigger.
A side effect of the joint Russian training allowed Luftwaffe Colonel Kurt Student to witness Soviet experiments using gliders for military purposes in the mid 1930’s. The Soviets, if anything, were not afraid to try wild and radical ideas in aviation, a policy that bore some fruit. Whilst these experiments might have been focused at delivering cargo to the front instead of troublesome parachute drops, the pin point accuracy of the gliders stuck in Colonel Student’s mind.
DFS-230 glider in a landing maneuvre
The political winds changed quickly in Germany from 1933 when Hitler became dictator; once fairly positive national relations soured and tensions rose. Many countries were still struggling with the Great Depression and thinking how to contain the threat of renewed hostility; instead most chose to build massive fortifications that quite rightly intimidated offensive action. Experience at the fortified city of Verdun during World War 1 proved fortifications’ value, and many believed this was still true.
The September 1939 “Munich Dictat” was the pivotal point; while Hitler gained substantial resources more important was obtaining the “state of art” Czech fortification system modelled closely on French and Belgian designs. Within days the Germans were developing ways to defeat modern fortresses like it. The resulting “Shape Charge” device did exactly that, but it was huge and heavy; how could anyone get past formidable defenses to attach the device?
Fort Eben-Emael in Belgium was considered the strongest and most strategically important fort in Belgium; so imposing that the German military thought it was impossible to breach, but it was noted that the top of the huge complex had a large, flat roof. At first considered an insane idea and rejected, Kurt Student was now in a position to bring his concept of airborne assault troops to reality with the perfect target. He formed an elite squad of hand picked troops, the finest the Wehrmacht had and trained with the Czech forts. The final and piece was finding a suitable glider, this was found in the scientific experimental DFS-230 glider, modified to become the world’s first production assault glider.
Fallschirmjäger pictured after capturing the
Belgian fortress Eben Emael, 12th of May 1940
The operation was an outstanding success, 78 paratroopers in 9 gliders surprised and neutralized the most powerful reinforced fortress in Europe and held captive 650 Belgian troops, at a loss of only 6. It was a huge point of pride for Germany, and for Hitler the best propaganda tool he could have ever dreamed of.
Within days the British started designing their own assault glider (General Aircraft GAL.48 Hotspur) and many other countries began forming or expanding their own paratroop force. It was obvious to all sides the value of rapidly inserting troops well behind enemy lines at strategic locations, forever banishing the spectre of stagnant and wasteful trench warfare. The airborne soldier was here and armies acquired an unprecedented level of mobility, this was just the beginning!
The War Thunder Team |
The United States has approved a massive sale to South Korea for AIM-9X-2 Sidewinder Missiles and other military equipment, the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency stated in a press release.
© REUTERS / U.S. Department of Defense, Missile Defense Agency/Handout More Money: US Missile Defense Agency Ups Lockheed THAAD Contract to $1.3Bln
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The Pentagon said the estimated cost of the approved sale of AIM-9X-2 Sidewinder Missilesis $70 million.
"The State Department has made a determination approving a possible Foreign Military Sale to the Republic of Korea for AIM-9X-2 Sidewinder Missiles and related support," the release stated on Wednesday.
The agency also announced the approval of a $70 million sale to South Korea for AGM-65G-2 Maverick missiles and other military equipment.
"The government of the Republic of Korea (ROK) has requested the potential sale of eighty-nine (89) AGM-65G-2 Maverick missiles, missile containers and other related elements of support," the release stated. |
As London becomes the bright shining center of the European tech scene, it's only natural that the city would like to maintain its place at the top of the pile. That's why mayor Boris Johnson is pledging that London will roll out a 5G network across the city by 2020. It's part of a long-term infrastructure investment plan that'll see connectivity given equal prominence to more conventional resources like transport, energy and water. At the same time, broadband speeds for each home in the capital will be made public alongside data from the networks in order to find communication blackspots that require additional work. Of course, given that 5G as a standard has yet to be defined, it'll be interesting to see if the mayor can make good on his promise -- unlike the one about turning London into a giant WiFi hotspot by 2012. |
quinn.anya via flickr Hiring managers confess that nearly 50 percent of new employees do not fulfill their job obligations in the first 18 months of employment based on research conducted by Leadership IQ.
Experts estimate that this type of bad hiring decision can cost your company as much as 20 to 200 percent of a year's salary according to HR Management. Besides just the cost, bad hires harm office morale, disrupt everyone's productivity, and are hard to fire as they get interwoven in office politics.
Why is the hiring system failing? The problem lies within the traditional screening process:
Looking Good On A Resume
With a little embellishment, clever wording, great font, good spelling and grammar, pretty much anyone can look good on a resume. Job seekers who are not great at writing their own resume can even hire a resume consultant such as Jeffrey Metzger for as low as $225. Metzger describes his role as follows:
"I specialize in writing high-quality, attention-getting personal marketing documents. A resume alone can't win you the job, but a poorly written resume can certainly eliminate you from consideration.
If you're a recent grad, changing careers, or a seasoned professional, we have a resume solution for you. Each resume is custom designed to reflect your goals and personality."
You can never be sure whether a resume is the work of the applicant in front of you, and if it is if it is 100% truthful. Ultimately, whether someone sounds good on a resume or not is not a great predictor of how they will perform on the job.
Random Filtering
There is an interesting story about sorting through a stack of resumes from co-founder of Podio Kasper Huithin. Huithin knew a guy who wanted to hire only lucky people. So he would take all the submitted resumes, put them into a stack, divide the stack in half, and throw out one of the new stacks (half of the resumes!). Similarly, some employers only look at resumes of candidates whose last name starts with a certain alphabet letter.
While other employers may not be as extreme with their resume filtering, some of the tactics they use are just as ineffective. Even filtering resumes through a keyword search is not that great. Looking for the word "manager" in all the resumes means you'll miss resumes of potentially great candidates who have the word "managing" or "management" or "managerial" instead.
Other hiring managers skim resumes looking for signs of past success, such as graduating from a top university. However, many of these success factors depend on having money and connections, which are also not great indicators of how the job candidate will actually perform in the job role you're hiring for.
The Interview Process
Some people are just good at interviewing. They are extroverted and agreeable, and almost everyone tends to like them. This is just one of the many biases a hiring manager might be bringing with her to an interview according to Pod Consulting:
"Have you ever met anyone and once you have got chatting experienced positive feelings about one characteristic that they possess (such as their appearance or that they possess a product you favor)? If you warm to this person because of the characteristic then everything they say seems so valid and in keeping with you - if you hear something that isn't quite in keeping with the characteristic, the chances are, you will ignore it."
Other interview biases include judging the interviewee based on your first impression, stereotyping, and comparing the candidate against other candidates instead of the job requirements.
As humans, hiring managers often decided whether the job candidate is a good fit based on gut instinct, subjectivity, and sometimes nepotism versus objective criteria of whether the job candidate will actually perform well in the specified role.
The Missing Piece
In 1984, Hunter and Hunter conducted a meta-analysis comparing eleven alternative predictors of job performance for entry-level positions. They found ability tests to be the best overall predictor of job performance, with a mean validity of 0.53. In contrast, interviews had the mean validity of only 0.14 as a predictor, resumes at a paltry 0.08, for actual job performance.
Yet, most hiring practices focus heavily on qualifying skills and personas of the job candidates, not on what is most important - whether the job candidate will be a productive part of the business. In this case, the best case scenario is to wait it out for 12 to 18 months to see the candidate's actual value.
The Future of Candidate Screening - Testing and Data
With the onset of advanced technology, most jobs are not the same as they were three years ago. Therefore, experience is not as valid as work ethic and problem solving ability. Psychometric testing allows employers to identify these traits, by screening job candidates for productivity, before a resume is read. Those tests that are based on actual psychology research, offer predictive indexes on how someone will actually perform in a given position.
The information received allows employers to properly filter applicants in the first place. They assist in asking poignant interview questions, and they determine 'diamond in the rough' candidates that would have been overlooked by the trappings of the traditional hiring process, in an efficient and cost saving process.
Big data refers to the process of capturing, curating, storing, analyzing, and visualizing data sets so large and complex, they cannot be handled with traditional software tools. Companies that use big data to make hiring decisions analyze statistics about employee turnover, performance, and employee assessments to understand what type of people will be most successful at each job. They then use their findings to implement hiring assessments, like the one mentioned above, that screen job applicants for the identified traits.
Choosing to implement psychometric testing and data collection, are always optional to the employer. However, their usages are on the rise and these two scientific methods are poised to change the future of the traditional hiring process over the next few years.
If you want to learn more about pre-employment psychometric testing, check out www.cream.hr for more details. |
The WiFi232 Internet Modem is here and available in limited quantities.
The WiFi232 Internet Modem features:
Standard DB25 female RS-232C connector (DCE).
Supports 300 to 115200 baud.
Emulation of a Hayes modem, using standard (and non-standard) Hayes “AT” commands.
Storage of settings and 10 speed dial addresses in flash memory.
Accepts inbound connections on customizable TCP port (produces “RING” response).
Automatically responds with a customizable busy message when already in a call.
Supports Commodore PET “MCTerm” character set translation (requires custom cable, interface).
Hardware and software flow control supported (one direction only– retro PC can pause incoming data).
Hardware flow control is RTS or DTR selectable with solder jumpers.
DTR + DCD and DTR + DSR loopback solder jumpers (RS-232C side only).
Over-the-air firmware updates.
Telnet negotiation support.
Built-in web server, MDNS support, and WiFi access point for easy configuration.
Powered by a USB mini jack or solder terminals for your own power source.
A PDF manual.
The WiFi232 Internet Modem lacks:
Support is lacking for DCD (data carrier detect) and RI (ring indicator).
No password protection of web server configuration (but can be disabled completely).
Price & Shipping:
Available as a kit ($33) or fully assembled ($49) (new prices June 25, 2017).
USPS First Class shipping to USA is $3 tracked (non-insured). USPS First Class International everywhere else for $15 tracked (non-insured).
If your shipment is lost or never arrives, you should contact your postal service and provide the tracking number for assistance.
Kits include a bare board with all loose parts for you to assemble yourself. All parts are through-hole EXCEPT two SMD parts (a USB mini jack and a SOT-223 voltage regulator).
Orders ship in about a week.
Order Policies
Please read this section carefully.
International orders: The CN22 customs form will be listed as type “others” with actual sales price. You may be responsible for additional VAT or import taxes. Do not ask to have the item listed as “gift”– your order will be canceled.
Orders that need to be canceled before shipping for reasons such as changed your mind, wrong shipping address, or CN22 type dispute will be subject to a $3 fee. Sorry, PayPal dings me to just return your money!
Order Here
The WiFi232 modem can be purchased below. I do not sell pre-orders. I only sell what I’ve built so far to ensure all orders can be fulfilled. If it’s listed as sold out, don’t worry– I’m busy making more for you. Follow @paulrickards on Twitter where I announce when more are available.
Sold out!
Manual
WiFi232 Internet Modem Manual (.PDF) Updated July 7, 2017
Discover new boards to call by visiting the Telnet BBS Guide.
The list of verified, compatible computers:
Atari Portfolio (with serial interface and 9 to 25 pin serial adapter)
Atari 520ST and 1040ST
Amstrad NC100
Texas Instruments TI-99/4A
Tandy TRS-80 Model 102 (with 25 pin gender changer)
Apple IIgs (with mini DIN to 25 pin serial cable)
Atari 800XL (with Atari 850 serial interface and appropriate cable)
Amiga 1000 (with 25 pin gender changer)
Amiga 2000
Amiga 1200
Macintosh SE
Macintosh SE/30
Digital VT220 and VT240 Terminal
Apple IIe (with serial card)
IBM 486-compatible (with 9 to 25 pin serial adapter)
Don’t see you computer listed? It will likely still work if it has a standard RS-232 serial port.
Reviews/Discussion |
PHP was my first programming language, and my initial exposure to JavaScript was through libraries like jQuery. There were things about JavaScript that always seemed to trip me up in the beginning due to how they worked differently than PHP. Heck there are still some things today that are confusing. I want to share some of the things that I struggled when I started working with JavaScript. I am going to cover the global namespace, this , knowing the difference between ECMAScript 3 and ECMAScript 5, asynchronous operations, prototypes, and simple JavaScript inheritance.
The Global Namespace
In PHP specifically, when you declare a variable function outside of a class (or namespace block) you are essentially adding a function to the global namespace. In JavaScript, there is no such thing as a namespace per se, rather everything is attached to the global object. In the case of the web browser, that is the window object. The other key difference is that in JavaScript, functions and variables are attributes of the global object, which we typically refer to as properties.
This can be troublesome because you won't get a warning in JavaScript if you overwrite a global function or property and it can actually be quite dangerous.
function globalFunction() { console.log('I am the original global function'); } function overWriteTheGlobal() { globalFunction = function() { console.log('I am the new global function'); } } globalFunction(); //outputs "I am the original global function" overWriteTheGlobal(); //this will overwrite the original global function globalFunction(); //outputs "I am the new global function"
One technique that is useful in JavaScript to ensure that your variables and functions are self contained is to use a immediately-invoked function expression, commonly known as a self-executing anonymous function. I typically expose things to the outside world by passing in a carrier object to the function. This is a variation of the module pattern.
var module = {}; (function(exports){ exports.notGlobalFunction = function() { console.log('I am not global'); }; }(module)); function notGlobalFunction() { console.log('I am global'); } notGlobalFunction(); //outputs "I am global" module.notGlobalFunction(); //outputs "I am not global"
Inside the self-executing anonymous function, all of the global scope is enclosed and we finish by attaching it the the module variable. Technically you could just append properties directly to the module variable, but the reason we are passing it in to the function is to make it explicitly clear what we are attaching our function to. It also allows us to alias the passed in object inside the function. The critical thing here is that we are declaring our dependencies upfront and not relying on global variables, other than the module variable.
You also might have noticed the var keyword. If you aren't sure of how it is used, a basic explanation is that by preceding a variable declaration with var creates a property on the nearest containing function. If you omit the var keyword than you are saying that you want to assign a new value to an existing variable higher up the scope chain, which may or may not be the global scope.
var imAGlobal = true; function globalGrabber() { imAGlobal = false; return imAGlobal; } console.log(imAGlobal); //outputs "true" console.log(globalGrabber()); //outputs "false" console.log(imAGlobal); //outputs "false"
As you can see, it is quite dangerous to rely on globals in your functions, due to possible side effects and collisions that are bound to occur. Now what happens when we use the var keyword?
var imAGlobal = true; function globalGrabber() { var imAGlobal = false; return imAGlobal; } console.log(imAGlobal); //outputs "true" console.log(globalGrabber()); //outputs "false" console.log(imAGlobal); //outputs "true"
JavaScript hoists the var declaration to the top of the function block, then initializes the variable. This is called variable hoisting.
To summarize: all variables are scoped to a function (which is itself an object), and where you declare those variables with var determines the function they are scoped to. Excluding var will imply global scope for a variable.
Let's look at how variable hoisting happens:
function variableHoist() { console.log(hoisty); hoisty = 1; console.log(hoisty); var hoisty = 2; console.log(hoisty); } variableHoist(); //outputs undefined (would get a ReferenceError if no var declaration existed in scope) //outputs "1" //outputs "2" try { console.log(hoisty); //outputs ReferenceError (no global var "hoisty") } catch (e) { console.log(e); }
So as you can see, it doesn't actually matter where you put the var declaration in the function, because the property gets created before the function executes any code. Now in practice, generally you want to put your var declarations at the top of the function, since that is where they end up anyway. It is also totally acceptable to initialize you variables at the top of the function, just be aware of the order of events here.
Functions declared with the function keyword in JavaScript (not variable assignment) also get hoisted. Behind the scenes, the entire function gets hoisted up and is made available for execution.
myFunction(); //outputs "i exist" function myFunction() { console.log('i exist'); }
This wholesale function hoisting does not occur when you use the var form of function declaration:
try { myFunction(); } catch (e) { console.log(e); //throws "Uncaught TypeError: undefined is not a function" } var myFunction = function() { console.log('i exist'); } myFunction(); //outputs "i exist"
Understanding "this";
Since JavaScript uses function scope, the meaning of this is quite different than what you get in PHP, and causes a lot of confusion. Consider the following:
console.log(this); // outputs window object var myFunction = function() { console.log(this); } myFunction(); //outputs window object var newObject = { myFunction: myFunction } newObject.myFunction(); //outputs newObject
this by default refers to the object a function is contained in. Since myFunction() is a property of the global object, this is a reference to the global object, which is window . Now when we mix myFunction() into a newObject , this now refers to newObject . In PHP and other similar languages, this always refers to the the instance of a class containing the method. You could argue that JavaScript is doing something stupid here, but truthfully much of the power of the JavaScript language comes from this feature. In fact, we can even replace the value of this when invoking our JavaScript functions by using the call() or apply() methods.
var myFunction = function(arg1, arg2) { console.log(this, arg1, arg2); }; var newObject = {}; myFunction.call(newObject, 'foo', 'bar'); //outputs newObject "foo" "bar" myFunction.apply(newObject, ['foo', 'bar']); //outputs newObject "foo" "bar"
But let's not get ahead of ourselves. All we are doing here is invoking the function myFunction by substituting an alternative value for this inside the function by placing the value of the object we want to use a substitute as the first argument. The fundamental difference between call() and apply() is the way you pass arguments to the function. call() will take an unlimited amount of arguments after the first argument and apply() expects and array of arguments as it's second argument.
Libraries like jQuery perform a lot of magic by invoking things this way. Let's look at the $.each() method in jQuery:
var $els = [$('div'), $('span')]; var handler = function() { console.log(this); }; $.each($els, handler); //iteration 1 outputs wrapped jquery dom element for "div" tag //iteration 2 outputs wrapped jquery dom element for "span" tag handler.apply({}); //outputs object
jQuery will often rewrite the value of this , so you should always try to be aware of what this means in the context of a jQuery event handler, or other such constructs.
Know the difference between ECMAScript 3 and ECMAScript 5
For many years, ECMAScript 3 has been the standard in most browsers, but more recently ECMAScript 5 has made it's way into most modern browsers (IE is still lagging behind). ECMAScript 5 introduced a lot of common sense features to JavaScript and some native methods that you previously relied upon a library for, such as String.trim() and Array.forEach() . The problem is you still can't rely on these methods being available in browser environments if you have users that are using Internet Explorer.
Take a look at what happens when we try to use String.trim in IE 8:
var fatString = " my string "; //in modern browsers console.log(fatString); //outputs " my string " console.log(fatString.trim()); //outputs "my string" //in IE 8 console.log(fatString.trim()); //error: Object doesn't support property or method 'trim'
So in the interim, we can use methods like jQuery.trim to do this for us, which I believe will fallback to String.trim if it is available in your browser for increased performance (native browser implementations are faster).
You might not care or even need to know about all of the differences between ECMAScript 3 and ECMAScript 5, but it is generally a good idea to check out the Mozilla Developer Network (MDN) for function reference to see what versions of the language a function is available in first. Generally speaking, you should be fine if you are using a library like jQuery or underscore to handle this for you.
If you are interested in using a polyfill of ECMAScript 5 for older browser, please check out https://github.com/kriskowal/es5-shim
Understanding Async
One of the things that tripped me up the most when beginning to work with JavaScript code, jQuery in particular is the fact that some operations are asynchronous. There were many times that I wrote code in a procedural manner expecting a result to be returned immediately without realizing it.
Take a look at this broken code:
var remoteValue = false; $.ajax({ url: 'http://google.com', success: function() { remoteValue = true; } }); console.log(remoteValue); //outputs "false"
It took me a while to realize that you need to program around asynchronous calls using callbacks to deal with the outcome of my ajax calls.
var remoteValue = false; var doSomethingWithRemoteValue = function() { console.log(remoteValue); //outputs true on success } $.ajax({ url: 'https://google.com', complete: function() { remoteValue = true; doSomethingWithRemoteValue(); } });
Another cool thing is deferred objects (sometimes called promises), which you can use to program in a more procedural style:
var remoteValue = false; var doSomethingWithRemoteValue = function() { console.log(remoteValue); } var promise = $.ajax({ url: 'https://google.com' }); //outputs "true" promise.always(function() { remoteValue = true; doSomethingWithRemoteValue(); }); //outputs "foobar" promise.always(function() { remoteValue = 'foobar'; doSomethingWithRemoteValue(); });
You can use promises to chain callbacks in a style that is in my opinion a bit easier to work with than nested callbacks in addition to a host of other benefits these objects offer.
Animations in the browser are also asyncronous, so this is also a common source of confusion. I'm not going to go into detail here, but you need to treat animations much like ajax requests in the way you handle them via callbacks. I'm not really an expert on the subject though so please take a look at the jQuery .animate() method.
Simple Inheritance in JavaScript
Grossly simplified, JavaScript clones objects to extend them, while PHP, Ruby, Python and Java use and extend classes. In JavaScript you have something called a prototype , and every object has one. In fact, all functions, strings, numbers and objects have a common ancestor, Object . There are two things about prototype to remember: blueprints and chains.
Each prototype is basically an object in itself that describes properties available when creating an instance of an object. The prototype chain is what allows prototypes to extend other prototypes. In fact, prototypes themselves can have prototypes. When a method or attribute does not exist on an object instance, then it is looked for in that object's prototype , and the prototypes's prototype , and so on until it finally reaches undefined if no such property exists.
Thankfully, beginners generally don't need to mess with this stuff at all, since it is easy enough to create an object literal and append properties to it at runtime.
var obj = {}; obj.newFunction = function() { console.log('I am a dynamic function'); }; obj.newFunction();
An easy way to extend objects that I use all the time is jQuery.extend()
var obj = { a: 'i am a lonely property' }; var newObj = { b: function() { return 'i am a lonely function'; } }; var finalObj = $.extend({}, obj, newObj); console.log(finalObj.a); //outputs "i am a lonely property" console.log(finalObj.b()); //outputs "i am a lonely function"
ECMAScript 5 offers us Object.create() , which you can use to extend from an existing object but you probably need to avoid using this if you need to support older browsers. It does offer distinct advantages to property creation and setting attributes of properties (yes, properties also have properties).
var obj = { a: 'i am a lonely property' }; var finalObj = Object.create(obj, { b: { get: function() { return "i am a lonely function"; } } }); console.log(finalObj.a); //outputs "i am a lonely property" console.log(finalObj.b); //outputs "i am a lonely function"
You can get pretty deep into the subject of inheritance in JavaScript but the beautiful thing here again is that you really don't have to due to the immense power and flexibility of the language.
Bonus Gotcha: Forgetting to use var in for loops
var i = 0; function iteratorHandler() { i = 10; } function iterate() { //this iteration will only run once for (i = 0; i < 10; i++) { console.log(i); //outputs 0 iteratorHandler(); console.log(i); //outputs 10 } } iterate();
The example is contrived, but you can see the danger here. The solution is to declare you iterator variables with var .
var i = 0; function iteratorHandler() { i = 10; } function iterate() { //this iteration will run 10 times for (var i = 0; i < 10; i++) { iteratorHandler(); console.log(i); } } iterate();
This all goes back to our scope rules. Remember to use var properly.
Summary
JavaScript may be the only language people don't need to learn before using it, but eventually you are going to run in to some unexplained trouble. Other than avoiding your own bugs, learning JavaScript makes a lot of sense these days considering it's rebirth and widespread availability. This blog by no means attempts to be a complete panacea, but hopefully it will help a few people understand some of the fundamentals before being forced into writing more awful JavaScript code, secretly hoping to get reassigned to a backend project buried in database queries in happy PHP land. |
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Florida Health officials meet next week to hammer out details of growing and dispensing low THC marijuana. The meeting comes after an administrative law judge threw out a proposed rule developed by the Health Department.
Four states have legalized recreational marijuana, and 23 states have some form of medical marijuana. But the law passed by Florida lawmakers last year is one of the most restrictive medical marijuana laws in the country.
The law required that five licenses for growing and distributing the non-euphoric pot be issued by Jan. 1. It hasn't happened and lawmakers are frustrated.
"I feel terrible for these families because we gave them our promise that we would have this ready to roll out to patients on Jan. 1," said Rep. Katie Edwards. "So it's imperative to us we have a product that's safe and effective that we can get to these patients."
Some lawmakers aren't waiting for low THC marijuana. A powerful senator has filed a medical marijuana bill similar to what 57 percent of voters said they wanted in November. Another said they will file a full legalization, or recreational marijuana, similar to Colorado and other states.
The original sponsor of low THC pot expects it all to be discussed.
"I think its an important discussion to have," said Sen. Bob Bradley. "Speaking for myself, I'll tell you that what I want to see is that we crawl before we walk and walk before we run."
After failed rule making attempts, the Department of Health will try negotiating a rule next week with all the key players.
At the earliest, the new rule won't be in place until the first of March, when lawmakers start meeting. And if the rule isn't ready, expect hearings.
Copyright 2015 by News4Jax.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. |
When the original Nvidia Shield TV came out in 2015 it was far and away the most powerful, most capable media streamer out there. Powered by Android TV and being 4K ready, it obliterated the competition with Ultra HD video support and offered a tasty sideline in enhanced gaming to boot.
It was pricy though – already more expensive than its peers and the remote control had to be bought as a £50 optional extra. That made it very much a premium purchase and one that was never going to make much of a dent in the sales figures of Roku or Amazon's Fire department.
Now a new version of the box is available and Nvidia is confident enough to keep it around the same price: £190. This time, however, you get a game controller with a mic for Google Assistant voice control (pending a software update), plus an improved version of the wireless remote included the box.
When you compare the Shield TV's talent to others on the market, the extra spend is justified. Here's why the 2017 Nvidia Shield TV really is the daddy of media streaming.
98 x 159 x 26mm; 250g
Smaller than 2015 model
Comes with new Shield Controller and Shield Remote
Those with the previous model don't need to consider an upgrade to this one. Bar a couple of design features and enhanced accessories, the 2015 Shield TV offers the exact same experience as the 2017 edition.
It now has identical software to the 2017 model, thanks to a downloadable update. And all the apps and menu systems are the same, including (pending a forthcoming software update) Google Assistant voice control and SmartThings smart home support. You do need the new Shield game controller for Assistant, as explained below, but that's available to buy separately and works fine with the old Shield too.
Both boxes run on Android 7.0 Nougat and have access to 4K HDR (high dynamic range) programming through Amazon Video, as well as Netflix and, ultimately, YouTube. You can also GameStream games in up to 4K HDR from a PC running a capable Nvidia GeForce graphics card.
If you're new to the device though, the latest version is the only one available and you're getting a better deal than before. It's smaller than before – considerably so. And while it still looks very "gamey", with its angled exterior panels and glowing green LEDs, at least you can hide it away more easily should you not like that sort of thing.
The game controller has also been redesigned. Not only is it now low-latency Bluetooth rather than Wi-Fi Direct, which should improve battery life, it fits far more comfortably in the hand. We're not entirely sure what's going on with the polygonal casing, which isn't as ergonomic as other gamepads out there, but it is lighter and less chunky than the previous version.
Google voice assistant compatible
Samsung SmartThings and wider smart home support
The controller also doubles as a wide-field microphone. This will be important come the full integration of Google Assistant through a future update, as the game controller will be the device to pick up your voice commands.
What is Google Assistant, how does it work and when can you use it?
Google Assistant will eventually enable the Shield TV to be controlled almost entirely by voice, and Samsung SmartThings support will add the ability to control smart devices around the house. It will effectively turn your Shield into a Google Home or Amazon Echo, albeit one that plays media through a TV rather than speaker and has the ability to bring up visual, on-screen results too.
We've seen it work with a Nest thermostat, coffee maker and lighting in an early demo, so it's an excellent addition when it comes. Nvidia chose to use the game controller as the mic, however, so you do need to leave it lying around within earshot, which might not please all home owners.
Nvidia told us that was necessary though. Putting the mic in the Shield TV box meant that it would have to be proudly displayed instead. Many owners want to hide it away in an AV cabinet or TV unit. And using the wireless remote was a no-no because of its size. You might lose it down the side of the sofa or the like, interrupting its voice pick-up capabilities.
The game controller is the most likely part of the package to be left on the top of the stand or somewhere to the side. We prefer to keep our game controllers in a drawer, but hey, horses for courses.
The wireless remote control does have a microphone, too, which works with the Shield TV's already-implemented voice search. It is contextual and works well, finding content across multiple apps in the one search session. This is more a feature of the Android TV platform and is nothing in comparison with Google Assistant when that arrives. You ain't seen nothing yet. Or heard it.
One excellent improvement to the remote is that it has a cell battery rather than rechargeable version. The former remote lasted about two weeks to a month on a charge, which was hugely annoying when all you wanted to do is watch an episode of Stranger Things. The new one lasts a year or so before needing a new, cheaply sourced battery. It also has an IR transmitter this time, which can be set to control your TVs volume as well as switch it on or off. The game controller can too.
HDMI 2.0b port with HDCP 2.2 and CEC support
Two USB 3.0 ports
Ethernet and 802.11ac Wi-Fi
The back of the Shield TV box is uncomplicated but well stocked. There is an HDMI 2.0 port that supports the HDCP 2.2 copy protection standard – essential for most Ultra HD content. It can also control your other home entertainment tech through HDMI CEC – allowing different devices to talk to each other and do things like switch on together with just one button press.
Importantly, it is also HDR capable – something few boxes on the market can do at present and a real game changer for those with compatible televisions. It can also handle Dolby Atmos and DTS-X audio streams, which will become more important as a greater number of soundbars and speaker systems adopt them.
There are two USB 3.0 ports on the rear too. These allow for connection of external drives or accessories, such as a keyboard. We advise getting a USB 3.0 hard drive or memory stick if you do fancy expanding the storage – especially from the meagre 16GB of the standard, non-Pro Shield TV. The data transfer rate of USB 3.0 is noticeable and if you store media files on an external USB 3.0 HDD, playback is far quicker.
There is a Shield TV Pro version available too, with 500GB of internal solid state drive storage, but at £280 it's considerably more expensive than the standard Shield and an external drive. You can even get a 1TB USB 3.0 drive these days for less than £50.
You can also use your Shield TV as a Plex media server these days (both the new and old models) so using a USB 3.0 drive means you'll be able to stream your content around the home efficiently too.
The last port on the back of the box, save for the mini-USB power input, is for Gigabit Ethernet. You don't necessarily need to cable the internet connection, with 802.11ac Wi-Fi supported too, but we thoroughly recommend it if you want a stable 4K HDR video flow from Netflix and Amazon Video.
Up to 4K HDR at 60fps
Google Chromecast support built-in
Dolby Atmos support
The main purpose of the Nvidia Shield TV is to play video and play it well, whether you are streaming your own films and TV shows stored locally or through services, such as Netflix and Amazon Video.
It is the only set-top-box available that plays both Netflix and Amazon Video in 4K HDR. The Amazon Fire TV plays Amazon's own content and Netflix in 4K, but no other external box supports HDR for both too.
This might not sound as good to you if you already own a 4K HDR television with both Netflix and Amazon Video as part of its smart functionality, but we've also found that the Shield TV plays them more efficiently. It locks down the highest resolutions faster than our 2016 LG E6 OLED TV, for example, which is no mean feat.
The thing missing is Dolby Vision on Netflix – content plays in standard HDR – but that's only relevant to a small handful of people who have the enhanced high dynamic response tech on their TVs. Until spring 2017, LG's OLED sets are the only tellies that support it and, even then, few others are currently planned for release. It's one of those things that would've been a nice-to-have, but largely irrelevant; HDR is more than good enough.
While Ultra HD resolutions are noticeably sharper than Full HD, high dynamic response tech is revolutionary and a real game changer. Higher brightness, greater contrast and a wider colour gamut result in distinctly better and more involving images.
There are plenty of HDR-ready TV shows available on both Amazon Video and Netflix these days, and they almost always look superb.
We're also waiting for YouTube to start streaming HDR content through its apps on a more universal basis. And for Google Play to introduce its 4K movie service for rental or purchase in the UK. But the support of the big two streaming services is welcome and more than enough to be getting on with.
The box is Chromecast enabled too, which means it works just like Google's own media streaming dongle. However, from our tests it doesn't replicate the Chromecast Ultra's ability with YouTube HDR content. It'll play YouTube 4K videos fine, when cast from an iPhone, iPad or Android device, but not in HDR.
Also disappointing, in a video sense, is that terrestrial TV catch-up is still poorly supported by Android TV and, therefore, the Shield TV box. While BBC iPlayer is available, ITV Hub, Demand 5 (My5) and All 4 are not. You can stream the three services from your mobile device through Chromecast support, but many rival devices support them natively, including the Amazon Fire TV and Roku boxes – a more elegant solution by far.
Android TV has support for some other media apps though, including DisneyLife – Disney's own Netflix-style service. Few other boxes can access it at present. And, as we've mentioned, the Plex app on the Shield TV is superb. Not only can it play your locally stored media with great metadata and cover art support, it can make your box a media server for all other devices to stream content from. The Kodi media player app is also available, for those without a Plex subscription.
Android 7.0 Nougat operating system
GeForce Now cloud gaming
Nvidia GameStream supported
While we feel the Nvidia Shield TV box betters its peers in video quality and support for the highest resolution and picture tech standards, those might not be enough to justify its price alone. Add its games-playing prowess though and you start to realise why you're paying a premium.
There's a good reason this box comes bundled with a game controller. Like its predecessor, the Shield TV uses its Nvidia Tegra X1 processing to enhance Android gaming and stream fully-fledged PC games locally or over the internet, with little perceptible lag on the latter.
The Android TV platform, updated to Android 7.0 Nougat in this case, offers plenty of games through the Google Play store – hundreds in fact. They have all been optimised to be played on a television, using a gamepad, but are generally the same games you've also played on an Android phone or tablet. Indeed, if you've bought them for your mobile device already, you can also play them on the Shield.
Nvidia also makes deals with some Android developers, who have enhanced some titles to make use of the improved graphics tech afforded by the Tegra X1 chipset. Versions of games, such as Portal 2 and Half-Life 2, are available for the Shield TV only, and they play just like their PC equivalents.
But for the best gaming experience, you can also subscribe to Nvidia GeForce Now, the company's cloud gaming service, or stream your own PC games over a home network.
The former is a service that has been available for a while now, with more than 40 games available to play as part of a monthly £7.49 membership fee. In addition, you can buy recently released games for one-off fees and play them over the cloud too.
The benefit to doing so is the games are hosted and played on high-end gaming PCs with the latest Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 graphics cards so will run in their highest settings. The video is sent over the internet to your Shield TV, while your controls are fed the other way. There is very little lag and it effectively feels like you are playing the game locally.
Video is displayed on your TV at up to 1080p in 60 frames per second, depending on your broadband speed, and we've rarely had any image issues.
Nvidia's GameStream tech is similar, but you host the games yourself. You need GeForce GTX graphics, preferably one of the newer models, and not all games are supported, but if both boxes are ticked you can play some of your best PC titles in resolutions up to 4K at 60fps. It even supports 4K HDR game streaming, but we're yet to encounter any HDR content in that sense.
During a demo using a very high-end gaming PC, running a GTX 1080 card, we managed to play Titanfall 2 in 4K and 60fps. It looked as if the computer was directly plugged into the TV and we didn't notice any controller lag at all. Considering it is a Bluetooth controller and running the game over a home network, that's impressive.
You do need to hardwire the internet connections of your Shield TV and PC to get the highest quality, but it still works over Wi-Fi in lower resolutions.
Regardless of how you do play your games, be they Android, over GeForce Now or GameStream, they are now all grouped together on the homescreen. Nvidia's previous, lightly customised menu system used to segregate them, but now just has a single section for games – in much the same way as there is an all-encompassing apps section.
Games will be tagged if they are housed on PC or in the cloud, after all, you'll need your computer on if you want to play them through GameStream, but we like the fact that there's a one-stop location to find titles.
You can deep dive into specific types a bit more in a dedicated Nvidia Games app, which keeps the homescreen clutter free. Other aspects of the menu screens have been simplified too, mainly thanks to Android 7.0, such as settings, although it retains a similar aesthetic to before. The top strip of the homescreen shows suggested and current content across different app. Voice search runs along the very top. |
It was one of the stranger moments of Ontario's young election campaign so far.
"We know that the government we had was on a track to privatize the TTC," Andrea Horwath pronounced on CBC Radio on Monday morning. When that brought a flabbergasted response from host Matt Galloway, who has covered Toronto's transit debate extensively and said he had never heard any such thing, the NDP Leader insisted it was "very, very clear that that's the case."
When pressed, in the interview and afterward, it turned out Ms. Horwath was referring to public-private partnerships to build transit lines. She was picking up on a campaign recently launched by a local union that seems to boil down to concerns about maintenance and electrical jobs being outsourced – something that falls a shade short of the selloff of the entire system she implied.
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Ms. Horwath was hardly the first politician to exaggerate or misrepresent an opponent's policies while on the campaign trail. But there is a bit of a disconcerting pattern of her struggling to back up her claims with facts.
There was, for instance, her visit a couple of weeks ago with this newspaper's editorial board. Asked whether new rules were needed for the use of legislative funds, after The Globe and Mail reported that a transparency gap allowed Ontario parties to quietly direct public dollars to friends and allies, Ms. Horwath replied that, with the NDP's encouragement, the province's integrity commissioner was looking at the matter. When asked, the commissioner's office indicated the review to which Ms. Horwath was referring actually was about something else, and caucus spending wasn't under its scope.
That confusion, and even the TTC claim, might be chalked up to a bad brief. But it's harder to think of any logical explanation for what happened during the leaders' debate in the last election.
That was when Ms. Horwath, trying to make a point about health-care spending, said that when her teenaged son suffered a fractured elbow, he was told by his local hospital that it couldn't afford a cast and that someone at home could help him with a sling. When the hospital pushed back, saying it had never received a complaint on the matter and that some fractures don't need to be treated with casts, she backtracked by saying: "The way it was put was that there's no need to spend money on a cast because it's not necessary."
At that time, Ms. Horwath was a fresh face who wasn't really perceived to be in the running to win government, and the episode received less attention than it probably would have if it had involved Dalton McGuinty or Tim Hudak. But this time around, Ms. Horwath is a veteran leader whose party enters the race more competitive. So, as her generally tough CBC interview suggested, she can expect a greater level of scrutiny.
One overstep, while all leaders were struggling to get their legs under them at the sudden start of the campaign, doesn't mean she won't hold up under the microscope. But if she wants to be taken seriously as a potential premier, she really can't afford to keep doing this kind of thing. |
Making for a busy couple of weeks, Aaron Eckhart has followed his Frankenstein project by signing on to play Dennis Wilson—the man who provided The Beach Boys’ beats in those early, insignificant days before they found John Stamos and really took off—in the upcoming The Drummer, a biopic from director Randall Miller. The film, written by Miller’s Bottle Shock collaborator Jody Savin, covers the final six years of Wilson’s life, beginning with the production of his cult album Pacific Ocean Blue and ending with his death by drowning in 1983, thereby handily sidestepping the Charles Manson era, as well as anything that would involve getting other members of The Beach Boys to sign off on it. Instead, it will focus exclusively on Wilson’s solo work, including several versions of Wilson’s songs re-recorded by Eckhart himself.
Eckhart, of course, last put his singing talents on display as an opera-belting chef in No Reservations—so in other words, no one has ever heard him sing. But he’s said to be already working on approximating Wilson’s smoke-cured rasp while also learning to play both the drums and piano, so clearly he’s serious. The Drummer joins that previously announced Brian Wilson biopic that’s still being developed by Oren Moverman; meanwhile, the big-screen version of Mike Love’s life story has already opened to rave reviews in Mike Love’s head. |
RICHMOND will need to overcome a dire record without vice-captain Brett Deledio if it is to rebound against the Brisbane Lions and get its season back on track at the Gabba on Saturday night.
Deledio has been ruled out for one more week as he battles calf soreness, which resurfaced after he played in round one after an interrupted pre-season.
The two-time club champion is available to return after serving a one-match suspension, but coach Damien Hardwick confirmed on Thursday he would need another week on the sidelines before playing.
The Tigers, who kicked just nine goals against the Western Bulldogs in round two, have lost four of their last five games without Deledio.
"He'll hopefully get the calf right for round four, so from our point of view we just move on," Hardwick said on Thursday.
"He's close enough but he's still got some soreness in that area, so it's one of those ones you can either take the week and play it conservatively or take the risk and miss three or four.
"He can get to a certain stage of running before it gets sore again, … but we're all over it, so we've got no doubt he'll play round four."
Deledio completed light skills work at Thursday's training session alongside defender Dylan Grimes, who has been ruled out for one to two weeks with a hamstring injury.
Hardwick said he was more concerned about finding more spark in the forward line, where Deledio has become a mainstay, than bolstering the team across half-back.
"I think our run and carry from our back half has been a real positive so far. We've been one of the best transition sides in the AFL," he said.
"But last week we didn't finish that well going across the arc. We had 17 marks inside 50 but only three loose-ball gets, which you generally win when you take 17 marks."
Tall defender David Astbury is a possible replacement for Grimes in the backline after recovering from being stung by a stingray, but Hardwick said the Tigers would need to consider how their backline matched up against a small Lions' forward group.
The coach was confident half-forward Shane Edwards (calf) and small defender Nick Vlastuin (hand) would be available, along with key forward Ty Vickery.
"Ty will train today. He missed last week's game with a knee complaint, so he's probably a little bit behind the eight-ball," Hardwick said.
"He hasn't played a lot of footy in the last three weeks, but we're still crying out for that third tall forward."
Half-forward Chris Knights is demanding selection after two strong weeks with the Tigers' VFL side and could come into the team either in attack or through the midfield.
"The one thing we like to see is two full games and Chris has done that now and played very well in both," Hardwick said.
"He's improved his flexibility being able to go through the midfield. It was the one thing we spoke about with him at the end of last year, improving his flexibility.
"Whether it's half-forward, midfield or wing, he's put his hand up in all of those areas.
"He's capable of kicking 40 goals a season, it'd be nice if he gets a bag for us on Saturday night." |
More than 55,000 Americans were either killed or injured by US police in just one year, a new study has revealed. Most of the deaths were from fatal firearm wounds or excessive use of taser devices.
The study, titled 'Perils of police action: a cautionary tale from US data sets,' covers the year 2012 and offers greater context to the issue of police brutality, which has only grown bigger in the four years since the research.
Published in the peer-reviewed British medical journal Injury Prevention, the study found that a total of 55,400 people were victims of police officers' “abuse of power” or “loss of control out of anger or fear" in 2012.
Among them, 1,063 people were either shot or tasered to death by law enforcement, out of an estimated 12.3 million arrests or stop-and-search incidents.
On average, nearly 34 people were killed or had to seek hospital treatment for injuries sustained from police per 10,000 stops or arrests.
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The research found that the numbers aren’t distributed evenly when it comes to race, ethnicity, or age.
“Blacks, Native Americans and Hispanics had higher stop/arrest rates per 10,000 population than white non-Hispanics and Asians,” the study’s authors stated.
“Given a national history of racism, the excess per capita death rate of blacks from US police action rightly concerns policy analysts, advocates and the press,” the study added.
“The excess appears to reflect exposure. Blacks are arrested more often than whites, and youth more often than the elderly.”
However, the study found that when black people are stopped or arrested by US police, they are “no more likely” than white people to be killed during that incident.
In 2015, there were 1,207 people killed by police across the US, according to Killed By Police resource data.
It comes on the backdrop of the latest chilling events of the kind - the killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, both African-American, in Louisiana and Minnesota. News of the events spurred massive protests nationwide.
One such protest in Dallas, initially peaceful, became violent when five police officers were killed and seven others wounded by a shooter, leading to the deadliest single incident for US law enforcement since September 11, 2001.
Earlier this month, black behavioral therapist Charles Kinsey was wounded in the leg while lying on the ground in a car park, his arms raised, after attempting to calm one of his autistic patients.
When police were asked why they shot the man, one of the officers simply said, “I don’t know.”
However, the most high-profile police violence case was when a white officer killed unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown almost two years ago in Ferguson, Missouri. The incident sparked weeks of violent unrest across the US and around the world. |
The UFC’s ninth event in Japan takes place Friday when UFC Fight Night 117 goes down from Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, and it’ll feature the in-studio analyst debut of a current UFC fighter.
The card airs on FXX following an early prelim on UFC Fight Pass and is headlined by a light heavyweight bout Ovince Saint Preux (20-10 MMA, 8-5 UFC) and former UFC title challenger Yushin Okami (34-10 MMA, 13-5 UFC).
A FOX Sports official today told MMAjunkie that UFC welterweight Alan Jouban (15-6 MMA, 6-4 UFC) will join the studio crew for the first time. He will accompany UFC champions Daniel Cormier and Michael Bisping at the desk, while Karyn Bryant serves as host. Megan Olivi is set to conduct backstage interviews.
Jouban will join the crew for Thursday’s weigh-in show on FS1, as well as the post-fight show on FXX following the event.
Doing commentary cageside for UFC Fight Night 117 will be the combination of Todd Grisham and former UFC welterweight Dan Hardy.
Jouban, who is coming off a first-round TKO loss to Niko Price at UFC Fight Night 114 in August, is no stranger to being in front of a camera. On top of his dual-career as a model, Jouban also has appeared on FS1’s “UFC Tonight,” UFC Fight Pass’ “UFC Now” program and also co-hosts a weekly podcast.
“Brahma” said he feels comfortable moving into the role as analyst but admitted his greatest challenge is going to be educating fans about athletes who are fresh faces to the UFC roster.
“Being that it is a Friday card, in Japan, there’s going to be some fighters who are making their UFC debut or a Japanese fighter name I’ve never heard or pronounced before,” Jouban told MMAjunkie. “Just making sure I do all the homework on those guys (is important). If this was a pay-per-view card in the states, and there was a bunch of very well known fighters, you know everything about them already. For this you need to do more research.”
Coincidentally, Jouban’s most anticipated matchup at UFC Fight Night 117 involves a promotional newcomer. Former kickboxing standout Gokhan Saki (0-1 MMA, 0-0 UFC) makes his UFC debut, and Jouban said he’s thrilled to see what he can do in MMA.
“He’s always been an undersized heavyweight fighting bigger guys,” Jouban said of Saki. “He was fighting Alistair Overeem when he was ‘The Reem,’ fighting 265 and Gokhan was 220. He’s such a smooth striker. He’s got this Mike Tyson-type style where he digs the body, throws the double left hook, kicks to the head. That’s the fight I’m most looking forward to. How does Saki fair with the four-ounce gloves.”
The full UFC Fight Night 117 card includes:
MAIN CARD (FXX, 10 p.m. ET)
Ovince Saint Preux vs. Yushin Okami
Jessica Andrade vs. Claudia Gadelha
Takanori Gomi vs. “Maestro” Dong Hyun Kim
Henrique da Silva vs. Gokhan Saki
Rolando Dy vs. Teruto Ishihara
Mizuto Hirota vs. Charles Rosa
PRELIMINARY CARD (FXX, 8 p.m. ET)
Alex Morono vs. Keita Nakamura
Jussier Formiga vs. Ulka Sasaki
Chan-Mi Jeon vs. Syuri Kondo
Shinsho Anzai vs. Luke Jumeau
PRELIMINARY CARD (UFC Fight Pass, 7:30 p.m. ET)
Daichi Abe vs. Hyun Gyu Lim
For more on UFC Fight Night 117, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.
Saint Preux def. Lima
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The campus of Georgetown University, top right, is seen past the Potomac River in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Andrew Harrer, Bloomberg)
A Georgetown University student was charged on Friday with possessing a lethal amount of ricin after admitting he made the poison in his campus dorm room.
Daniel Harry Milzman, 19, of Bethesda, Md., allegedly showed off a bag of homemade ricin to his dorm adviser, who notified school authorities. The school contacted police, and testing confirmed the substance was ricin, a court document showed.
The FBI affidavit said he learned how to make ricin on his iPhone and then bought ingredients at retail stores.
"Based on our investigation, we do not believe there is any connection to terrorism," said Andrew Ames, a spokesman for the FBI's Washington Field Office told The Washington Post. He declined to discuss Milzman's motivation for possessing the toxin.
"There is no immediate threat to members of the Georgetown community," a press release from the university stated. "Anyone exposed to ricin would have presented with severe symptoms within 24 hours. This window has passed and there are no reports consistent with ricin exposure."
Contributing: The Associated Press
Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1gc4Of3 |
Introduction Hai I’m Zephya and this is a semi in-depth guide for the class Mystic. This guide will cover appropriate gear choices, glyph choices, skill usages and other tips to better your game-play. Hopefully this will guide new Mystics whilst helping current Mystics better themselves. While this guide will prepare you in knowing what to do with your Mystic – your true training comes from experience of applying what you know in actual game-play. This guide has been updated for Mystic Awakening (02/11/2018) TABLE OF CONTENTS Gear
Skills and Glyphs
Talents
Gameplay
Tips
Consumables
Future Patches, Notes and Credits
As of now, the guide has a focus on Mystic Awakening. As the base line of gear increases, being non-awakened should be non-existent in the near future, so I’m sorry that this guide no longer caters to non-awakened Mystics. I am aware that some of you play console, so for now I’ll be adding in a non-Awakened section.
Your Role
Mystic is a support class of TERA. Your primary role is to support your party through dungeons. There are several areas of support which you can offer, namely: Healing and Cleansing, Buffs, Shields, MP management, De-buffs (Enemies), Crowd Control and additional DPS. There are also “healer specific” mechanics in dungeons which require support from the healer. You must do all of this while surviving yourself, which involves correct positioning and use of tools.
Awakening
Mystic’s awakening changes their game-play a bit. They are required to do more and have ways to support the party such as shielding knockdowns and push backs, as well as buffing the party. This guide caters towards the Awakened Mystic. If you’re not awakened, the guide should still be able to somewhat guide you in the right direction and may give you some tips for the future. The biggest differences are thralls and mana, in my opinion. Your thralls won’t give the enhanced effects and therefore won’t need to be casted for DPS support – in addition, since Thrall of Life doesn’t give MP and you won’t be able to explode motes via Arunic Release – you’ll have use Corruption Ring a lot more.
Gear
Builds
Mystics should opt for the standard Support build, I have proposed the Cooldown build: This is a balance between Cooldown Reduction and Attack Speed, with additional Crit Factor. There are parts where you can choose between survival rolls (Endurance and HP) and offensive/support rolls (Crit Factor) – You need to examine your gameplay; if you can minimize the damage you receive then you can trade these survival rolls for Crit Factor, which might aid in your overall support.
Weapon: Recommended Top Stat Roll: Decrease skill cooldown by 7.2% – Universal cooldown is essential to properly support your party. Recommended Bottom Stat Rolls:: Decrease skill cooldowns by 7.2% – To pair with the top stat roll and the base roll, this will give you 21.6% universal cooldown on all skills.
Increases Attack Speed by 4.5% – Attack speed offers reduces the animation locks and increases the ability to throw out faster support and heals.
Increases healing by 6% – More healing is always good.
Increases Crit Factor by 14 – This is only if you can roll 4 lines, if you can only roll 3, then choose the above 3. It’s best to go Crit Factor for extra crit heals. You can also substitute this for the MP role if you find yourself running into MP issues a lot. Note: Mid-Tier gear have 4 rerollable options, while High-Tier gear has 5. Stormcry gear will offer additional support stats on +7, 8 and 9, whilst Heroic Oath will add them to the base stats.
+9 Stormcry Scepter
Level: 65
Mystic
Attack Modifier: 13,432 (+1,813)
Increases MP regen by 29
Punishing Mark
Recovers 10,471 HP
Decreases skill cooldowns by 7.2%
Increases PvP defense by 10
Increases Attack speed by 4.5%
Increases your healing skills by 450
+ Decrease skill cooldowns by 7.2% (+1,813) + Increase your healing skills by 6%
+ Decrease skill cooldowns by 7.2%
+ Increase Attack Speed by 4.5%
+ Increase Crit Factor by 14
+7: Replenishes 0.6% of your total MP instantly when you use a skill.
+8: Increases your healing skills by 450.
+9: Decreases skill cooldowns by 1%. Level: 65 Armor: Recommended Top Stat Roll – Skill modifier: Decreases the cooldown of Teleport Jaunt by 15% – Decreased cooldown on your only iframe and escape will boost your survivability, this 7% paired with other cooldown reduction brings it down to 3.5ish seconds. Recommended Bottom Stat Roll: Decreases damage from enraged monsters by 10% – More damage reduction; means more survivability – you also can face tank hits while dishing out support for your party.
Reduces damage by 6% – Same as above.
Decreases damage from frontal attacks by 6.9% – Same as above, however your character/you must be facing the boss for this to work.
Increase max HP by 8% – More health is nice as well, this can be substituted in for the frontal damage if you feel this is a safer option, increasing your overall HP will increase your Arun’s Vitae Glyph heal (as it’s 20% of your max HP). Note: Mid-Tier gear have 4 rerollable options, while High-Tier gear has 5 rerollable options. Chests have a unique top line skill roll.
+9 Stormcry Mystic Robe
Level: 65
For Mystic
Defense Modifier: 8,382 (+754)
Raises max MP by 2,469
Raises max HP by 8%
Reduces damage taken by 6%
Decreases damage from enraged monsters by 10%
Increases Crit Resist Factor by 30
Increases Power by 22
Increases Endurance by 6
+ Decrease the cooldown of Teleport Jaunt by 7% Level: 65 + Decreases damage from enraged monsters by 10%
+ Reduces damage by 6%
+ Decreases damage from frontal attacks by 6.9%
+ Increase max HP by 8%
+7: Increase Endurance by 3
+8: Increase damage by 1%
+9: Raises max HP by 4% Gloves: Recommended Bottom Stat Roll Increases healing by 6% – More heals is always good.
Increases Attack Speed by 2.25% – Attack speed offers reduces the animation locks and increases the ability to throw out faster support and heals.
Increases Endurance by 12 – More Endurance allows you to survive better.
+9 Stormcry Sleeves
Level: 65
Sorcerer, Priest, Mystic
Defense Modifier: 6,288 (+565)
Increases Crit Factor by 12
Increases Attack Speed by 2.25%
Decreases damage taken from crits by 15%
Increases Power by 19
Increases Endurance by 21
Increases skill damage by 3% Level: 65 + Increases healing by 6%
+ Increases Attack Speed by 2.25%
+ Increases Endurance by 12
+7: Increase Endurance by 3
+8: Increase damage by 1%
+9: Raises max HP by 4% Footwear: Recommended Bottom Stat Roll Increases Movement Speed by 6% – Being mobile on a Mystic is key, it allows you to escape attacks instead of using your only escape, which can be saved for other situations.
Increases Endurance by 4 – More Endurance is more defense, which allows you to survive in general more.
Replenishes 2% of total MP every 5 seconds – This should help you with any MP problems, it seems like a small amount but it stacks up.
+9 Stormcry Shoes
Level: 65
Sorcerer, Priest, Mystic
Defense Modifier: 6,288 (+565)
Increases Movement Speed by 13%.
Increases total HP by 4%.
Increases Power by 22
Increases Endurance by 6
Increases Crit Resist Factor by 24. Level: 65 + Increases Movement Speed by 6%
+ Increases Endurance by 4
+ Replenishes 2% of total MP every 5 seconds
+7: Increase Endurance by 3
+8: Increase damage by 1%
+9: Raises max HP by 4% Belts: Belts are a complimentary gear piece, don’t worry too much about it. Viable Rolls
Increases max HP by 2.3% – More max HP allows you to survive through flat damage attacks better.
Increases max HP by 1.5% – See explanation for max HP by 2.3%
Stormcry Belt
Level: 65
Defense Modifier: 3,242
Raises max HP by 12,686.
Increases Power by 10.
Increases Endurance by 10.
+ Increases max HP by 2.3%
+ Increases max HP by 1.5% Level: 65Raises max HP by 12,686.Increases Power by 10.Increases Endurance by 10.+ Increases max HP by 2.3%+ Increases max HP by 1.5% Accessories: Accessories, for me, include anything which isn’t a main gear piece (Weapon, Armor, Gloves, Shoes or Belt). There’s quite a few pieces of additional gear you can rock: Jewellery, Brooches, Innerwear, Circlets and Masks. Rerollable Stats: Jewellery Jewellery make up the main bulk of accessories, they can be etched and can equipped a crystal (Vyrsk). There is less variation in jewellery choice now compared to previous patches. There’s no reason for a Healer to go Pumped, so stick with a full Carving set. This will give you some base crit for some Crit Healing. On top of this, you want to stack Endurance, HP and Healing Modifiers. Rings Rings can offer Endurance, Healing or Crit Factor. Generally you should aim for the following rerollables: Increases Endurance by 4
Increases Healing by 256
Carving Daylight Ring
Level: 65
Attack Modifier: 717
Raises max MP by 172
Increases Endurance by 3
Incrreases Crit Factor by 42
Increases your healing skills by 173
Increases PvP Defense by 3
Increases Healing by 199
+ Increases your healing skills by 256
+ Increases Endurance by 4 Level: 65 Earrings Your Earrings offer you defense and an increase in HP. Raises max HP by 4%
Increases Endurance by 4
Carving Daylight Earring
Level: 65
Defense Modifier: 931
Raises max HP by 8,570
Increases Attack Speed by 2%
Increases Crit Resist Factor by 42
Increases Crit Factor by 30
Increases PvP Defense by 3
+ Raises max HP by 4%
+ Increases Endurance by 4 Level: 65 Necklace Your necklace offers you Attack Speed on its base stats and one rerollable. Increases Endurance by X – Endurance gives you more defense.
Increases healing by X – Although Mystics do get some benefit from this roll, it is not ideal compared to Crit Factor or Endurance.
Carving Daylight Necklace
Level: 65
Attack Modifier: 732
Raises max MP by 245
Increases Attack Speed by 6%
Increases Crit Resist Factor by 34
Increases Crit Factor by 38
Increases your healing skills by 209
Increases PvP Defense by 4
+ Increases Endurance by 4 Level: 65 Rerollable Stats: Brooch Cleansing Brooch (or Quatrefoil and Marrowbrooch) is the viable brooch for healers as it offers Crit Factor and a self-cleanse skill. If you can change your presets, you can carry a Simple Quickcarve which you can use to speed up your resurrection skill on tricky bosses. As for belts, it’s just a complimentary gear piece, don’t worry too much about it, roll it the same way. Viable Rolls
Increases max HP by 2.3% – More max HP allows you to survive through flat damage attacks better.
Increases max HP by 1.5% – See explanation for max HP by 2.3%
Cleansing Brooch
Level 65
Attack Modifier: 345
Increases Crit Factor by 6
+ Increases max HP by 2.3%
+ Increases max HP by 1.5% Level 65 [Accessory] Contains a usable skill to remove harmful effects. Drag to shortcut tray after equipping to use as a skill.
[Skill]: Cleanse harmful effects Cooldown: 3 min Cooldown: 3 min Rerollable Stats: Circlet This accessory offers limited variation and doesn’t matter too much, but do obtain one. You can go either Critical Factor or Endurance. Options
Increases Crit Factor by 8
Increases Endurance by 4
Daylight Circlet
Defense Modifier: 848
Raises max MP by 528
Increases Crit Resist Factor by 16
Increases Endurance by 9
Concentration II
Increases Crit Factor by 8 Fixed Stats: Innerwear This is situational and more of a preference, you can go either HP or Endurance, it shouldn’t matter too much in the long run but a lot of attacks from bosses can be HP based, which requires you heal yourself more if you have a higher HP pool, in addition, extra endurance give you more defence against non-HP based attacks. Options
Fitness – Max HP. Increasing your max HP can help you survive flat damage better.
Endurance – Endurance. Increasing your Endurance can help you survive general damage and is better for healing through %-based damage.
Insulated Catspaw Innerwear
Level 1 – iLvl: 317
Defense Modifier: 486
Increase max HP by 3,935
Increase Endurance by 14 Fixed Stats: Mask The newest addition to gear is the Mask. This comes in 4 variations Energetic (Cooldown) and 3 others, which are irrelevant to you. In future patches you will be able to dismantle and upgrade them but for now you have to face RNG to get an Energetic Mask as you cannot change the roll. It’s the only useful one for Mystics. There’s currently 2 tiers, with a 3rd coming soon, Onset and Infinity. Options
Decreases skill cooldowns by 3% – More universal cooldown reduction.
Energetic Infinity Mask
Decreases skill cooldown by 3%
Increases Endurance by 3 Crystals: Remember to use the Fine version of these crystals. They’re expensive and are obtainable through Vanguard Credits, so use a Complete Crystalbind. Weapon Crystals: For Dyads: I recommend Relentlessly (HP) or Poisedly (Enrage Damage Reduction) Swift – This allows you to be quicker whilst in combat as if you get hit, you’ll be able to still move around at a faster speed than default combat speed, allowing you to get out of situations without using up your only escape. Brilliant – This gives you MP regen, which is vital if you’re going to constantly dishing out skills without getting MP back. You should use 3 of these (2 if you use 1 Carving) Carving – This is situational, if you feel your MP is good enough and want to try and crit heal a bit more, then feel free to use 1 Carving instead of a Brilliant. Armor Crystals: For Dyads: I recommend Swiftly (Movement Speed) Hardy – Hardy would be your most useful defense crystal, it offers universal damage reduction and will help you a lot. For most dungeons, a 4 Hardies setup is recommended. Relentless – This is your situational crystals useful for flat damage attacks (the damage you receive is a set amount of HP regardless of your defense). Some healers use these to able to tank more flat damage; however any other incoming attacks would be fatal, so experienced gameplay is needed. Accessory Crystals: Swift Vyrsk Being swift is always a great thing. With 4 Vyrks you’ll get 4% attack speed – allowing you to execute skills faster. Being able to execute skills faster means less time stuck in animation. I recommend using these. Grounded Vyrks If you are not comfortable with a dungeon, you may get hit more. Using these vyrsks will increase your endurance, meaning your defense to help you with survivability while you learn the dungeon. These are especially useful in Harrowhold. Succoring Vyrsk These increase your healing output. I personally don’t know a time where I would need more healing output however. Etching: Offensive Etchings: Weapon and Gloves should have Energetic Etching , as they offer Attack Speed and Cooldown reduction. Being swifter and having skills on a low cooldown when you have a limited tool kit will help you in tough situations.
Weapon/Glove Etching: Energetic IV
Superior [Effect] Permanently increases Attack Speed by 5% and decreases skill cooldown by 3% Superior Defensive Etchings: Armor and Footwear should have Grounded Etching . More Endurance is always good for a PvE player, regardless of class.
Armor/Footwear Etching: Grounded IV
Superior [Effect] Permanently increases endurance by 10 Superior Accessory Etchings: Accessory‘s should have Relentless Swift Etching or Swift Etching , these offer Combat Movement speed and HP.
Accessory Etching: Relentless Swift III
Superior [Effect] Permanently increases Combat Movement Speed by 2 and max HP by 2,000. Superior
Skills and Glyphs
Mystics have a wide range of skills, in fact they probably have the most amount of skills. For PvE, many of the skills become somewhat useless or situational. Going even further, some skills become somewhat useless in party play. I have split the skills and glyphs into sections:
Skills: Damage Skills : These are skills which are used to deal damage.
: These are skills which are used to deal damage. Core Skills : These are skills which are used constantly throughout gameplay, specifically PvE – Party Play (and solo).
: These are skills which are used constantly throughout gameplay, specifically PvE – Party Play (and solo). Thralls : These skills are our Thrall summons.
: These skills are our Thrall summons. Other : These skills are deemed useless or utility, such as some Crowd Control skills. Glyphs: Red glyphs aren’t useful, they shouldn’t be used.
glyphs aren’t useful, they shouldn’t be used. Orange glyphs can be useful in certain situations.
glyphs can be useful in certain situations. Green are always useful and are important for effective Mystic play.
Glyphs:
Before we get into any skills, this is my Glyph page for healing. Note this is for the Awakened Mystic.
This is my Glyph page, you can make alterations as you see fit, for example some people don’t like the RNG on Thrall of Life resetting, so they choose another glyph such as increased Health Restoration on Warding Totem, but the general idea is there.
Core Awakened Arunic Release Skill Usage: Arunic Release is an awakened support skill which explodes the motes Arun’s Vitae and Arun’s Tear. You can explode up to 5 infront of you. Exploding either one will apply both effects of the mote (similar to as you would when picking them up) to anyone in range of the explosion, for example exploding an Arun’s Tear will also give the healing affect of Arun’s Vitae to anyone in range. The effect of healing is still limited to 2 stacks, even though you can explode 5 motes. Arunic Release
Cast time: 1.2 sec
MP cost: 875
Cooldown: 5 seconds
Base Damage: 6,500 Explode all motes ahead of you (limited to 5), Arun’s Vitae and Arun’s Tear both apply HP recovery and MP replenishment to allies and deal damage to enemies. Explode all motes ahead of you (limited to 5), Arun’s Vitae and Arun’s Tear both apply HP recovery and MP replenishment to allies and deal damage to enemies. Core Arun’s Vitae Skill Usage: This is your main self-heal. Players, including yourself, can pick them up to recover HP every second for a few seconds, it also cleanses any harmful effects. Placement is important as if you should fall in combat, your party members can still use them. Picking up two heals you for quite a bit. Glyphs: Glyph of Blaze: The cast time isn’t too long for Arun’s Tears for this to make a drastic difference. Glyph of Restoration: This is your main self-heal. This heals you 20% of your total max HP when you cast Arun’s Vitae, you can then pick up the mote if you need extra heals. Arun’s Vitae XI
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 180 180
Cooldown: 5 seconds Gather Arunic power to create a mote that recovers 10254 HP every second for 3 seconds and removes all harmful effects. Charge up the mote’s range by holding down the skill button, then shoot the mote up to 18m by releasing the button. HP recovery effect can stack up to 2 times. (3) Glyph of Blaze : Speeds casting of Arun’s Tears by 25% for a few seconds.
(3) Glyph of Restoration : [Master] Immediately recovers 20% of total HP . Gather Arunic power to create a mote that recovers 10254 HP every second for 3 seconds and removes all harmful effects. Charge up the mote’s range by holding down the skill button, then shoot the mote up to 18m by releasing the button. HP recovery effect can stack up to 2 times.: Speeds casting of Arun’s Tears by 25% for a few seconds. Core Arun’s Tears Skill Usage: This one of the ways to give MP. Players, including yourself, can pick them up to recover 20% of their total MP. Placement is important to minimize DPS loss. This mote can be exploded by using Arunic Release, effectively applying both Arun’s Tear and Arun’s Vitae to anyone near enough. Glyphs: Glyph of Blaze: The cast time isn’t too long for Arun’s Vitae for this to make a drastic difference. Arun’s Tears
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 150, 150
Cooldown: 5 seconds
Gather Arunic power to create a mote that instantly replenishes MP by 20%. Charge up the mote’s range by holding down the skill button, then shoot the mote up to 18m by releasing the button. (4) Glyph of Blaze : Speeds casting of Arun’s Tears by 25% for a few seconds. Gather Arunic power to create a mote that instantly replenishes MP by 20%. Charge up the mote’s range by holding down the skill button, then shoot the mote up to 18m by releasing the button.: Speeds casting of Arun’s Tears by 25% for a few seconds. Core Awakened Thrall Augmentation Skill Usage: Thrall Augmentation is an awakened support skill which allows the thralls to give party members a buff upon cast. You should have this on 100% of the time, however it will drain your MP, you must manage it properly (potions, skills and crystals). The bonuses from thralls support the party immensely and discussed later on in the Role section, see the tooltip on the right to see what each thrall offers. Arunic Release
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 250
Cooldown: 2 seconds
While activated, using a summon skill summons enchanced thralls that grants beneficial effects to nearby allies. While activated, using a summon skill summons enchanced thralls that grants beneficial effects to nearby allies. Thrall of Protection: Grants a shield that absorbs 30000 HP for 12 seconds with umminty to knock-down and stagger while the shield is active. Costs an additional 340 MP.
Thrall of Life: Removes harmful effects cast on nearby allies. For 5 seconds, increases Movement Speed in combat by 10 and heals 1.5% (15% typo) of maximum HP and replenishes 10% of maximum MP per second. Costs an additional 700 MP.
Thrall of Vengeance: Increases Power by 15 for 12 seconds. Effect ends if knoced-down. Costs additional 700 MP.
Thrall of WWrath: Increases Crit Power by 0.6 times for 20 seconds. Effect ends if knocked-down. Costs additional 1000 MP. Core Thrall of Protection Skill Usage: This is Shielding Thrall, it has two uses. It has a Glyph which gives every one 10% Endurance for 10 minutes. The endurance buff will remain even if you dismiss the thrall.
This thrall also applies a shielding effect on party members (within an area) when Awakened: Thrall Augmentation is activated. This is a 30,000 HP shield which prevents knockdown and pushback. This is good to stop interruption to DPS, or bypass mechanics which would normally kill your party. Glyphs: Glyph of Energy: You’d want to keep this available for mechanics, and since it has a long cooldown, it might be a good idea to reduce it. Glyph of Power: You won’t use this in party play for damage. For solo play, you might so this is up to you. Glyph of Fortification: You won’t use this in party play for tanking/damage. For solo play, I’d rather just recast and spend the points somewhere else. Glyph of Grounding: The best use for this thrall is this buff, it offers 10% more endurance for your whole party, this may be the difference between a 1 hit attack and surviving. Thrall of Protection XVI
Cast time: 2.8 seconds
MP cost: 425
Cooldown: 50 seconds Summon a Thrall of Protection that uses melee attacks to draw aggro from monsters and defend the summoner. Lasts 10 minutes or until death. Summoning a Thrall of Life will cancel Thrall of Protection. (5) Glyph of Energy : Decreases cooldown by 10%.
(4) Glyph of Power : Increases the thrall’s damage by 25%.
(4) Glyph of Power : [Master] Increases the thrall’s damage by 30%.
(3) Glyph of Fortification : Increases the thrall’s defence by 25%.
(4) Glyph of Grounding : [Master] Increases all party members’ Endurance by 10% for 10 minutes.
(2) Glyph of Grounding : [Master] Increases all party members’ Endurance by 10% for 10 minutes. Summon a Thrall of Protection that uses melee attacks to draw aggro from monsters and defend the summoner. Lasts 10 minutes or until death. Summoning a Thrall of Life will cancel Thrall of Protection.: Decreases cooldown by 10%.: Increases the thrall’s damage by 25%.: Increases the thrall’s defence by 25%. Core Thrall of Life Skill Usage: This thrall offers a quick burst heal and an AoE cleanse. It can be life-saving and can soak up damage. Under the effect of Awakened: Thrall of Augmentation, it cleanses upon cast and heals 15% of everyones HP per second for 5 second, it also replenishes MP. Therefore it’s a excellent skill to quickly heal and cleanse, aid in healing specific mechanics, or replenish MP. Glyphs: Glyph of Energy: This Thrall makes healing so much easier, especially when everyone is low and needs a pick-me-up, so having it more readily available is beneficial. Glyph of Lingering: The thrall lasts 10 seconds, this glyph enables it one more heal than usual. Personally, don’t use it because it’s 2 points I can spend elsewhere. Glyph of Persistence: This is your Awakened Glyph. Same reasoning as Glyph of Energy, it’s quite nice to have the reset as you’ll find yourself able to use it more often. However, this is a big investment and points can be equally spent elsewhere. Thrall of Life XIII
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 875
Cooldown: 45 seconds
Summon a Thrall of Life that periodically heals you and removes harmful effects. Lasts 10 seconds or until death (Thrall of Life is immune to damage). Summoning a Thrall of Protection will cancel Thrall of Life. (5) Glyph of Energy : Decreases cooldown by 20%
(2) Glyph of Energy : [Master] Decreases cooldown by 20%
(2) Glyph of Lingering : [Master] Increases the thrall’s duration by 25%
(2) Glyph of Persistence : [Awakened] 20% chance to eliminate cooldown. Summon a Thrall of Life that periodically heals you and removes harmful effects. Lasts 10 seconds(Thrall of Life is immune to damage). Summoning a Thrall of Protection will cancel Thrall of Life.: Decreases cooldown by 20% Core Thrall of Vengeance Skill Usage: This is one of your most important support skills for your party as it increases Power by 15 for 12 seconds for members when using Awakened: Thrall Augmentation. You should aim to use this off cooldown and attempt to get all party members. It can also be used as an entity to take de buffs or soak up shared damage. This thrall spawns in the direction your character is facing, not the camera. Glyphs: Glyph of Power: Not useful. Glyph of Fortified:: The thrall’s defense is pretty weak, cast it away from danger. It is long range. Glyph of Lingering: It lasts 60 seconds, the base cooldown is 22 seconds, not worth the points. Thrall of Vegneance XIV
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 875
Cooldown: 22 seconds
Summon a Thrall of Vengeance that attacks your enemies at range. Lasts 60 seconds or until death. Summoning a Thrall of Wrath will cancel Thrall of Vengeance. (3) Glyph of Power : Increases the thrall’s damage by 25%
(3) Glyph of Fortified : Increases the thrall’s defense by 25%
(3) Glyph of Lingering : Increases the thrall’s duration by 25%
(2) Glyph of Lingering : [Master] Increases the thrall’s duration by 35%. Summon a Thrall of Vengeance that attacks your enemies at range. Lasts 60 seconds or until death. Summoning a Thrall of Wrath will cancel Thrall of Vengeance.: Increases the thrall’s damage by 25%: Increases the thrall’s defense by 25%: Increases the thrall’s duration by 25% Core Thrall of Wrath Skill Usage: Summons a thrall.. of wrath.. to deal wrath. This AI is supposedly improved, and it does deal a quite a lot of burst damage. More importantly it applies a 20 second buff to party members (in range) which increases their Crit Power by 0.6 when used whilst Awakened: Thrall Augmentation is active. This is skill is used for burn phases, which are discussed later and should be complimentary to Contagion. Glyphs: Glyph of Energy: With this glyph and cooldown reduction rolls, Thrall of Wrath cuts down from 5 minutes to 55 seconds, which is good as it’ll be up for every burn phase. (4) Glyph of Power: I’ve never worked this into my healing build, but as a DPS it may be an interesting glyph to play with. (4) Glyph of Haste: Cast time is instant whilst under Thrall Augmentation, has no effect. Thrall of Wrath VII
Cast time: 2.8 seconds
MP cost: 1250
Cooldown: 10 minutes
Summon a Thrall of Wrath for a powerful area attack. Thrall will attack randomly with its three powerful attacks until it dies. Summoning a Thrall of Vengeance will cancel Thrall of Wrath. (5) Glyph of Energy : Decreases cooldown by 50%.
(4) Glyph of Power : Increases the thrall’s damage by 25%.
(4) Glyph of Haste : Speeds casting by 30%. Summon a Thrall of Wrath for a powerful area attack. Thrall will attack randomly with its three powerful attacks until it dies. Summoning a Thrall of Vengeance will cancel Thrall of Wrath.: Decreases cooldown by 50%.: Increases the thrall’s damage by 25%.: Speeds casting by 30%. Core Contagion Skill Usage: This, in addition to Crit Aura, is what sells a Mystic. Contagion applies an addition 5% endurance debuff for 20 seconds. This can be increased to 29/30 seconds with Noctentium and Lingering glyph. With triple cooldown reduction and etching, you’re look at about 1 minute down time. Aim to use this skill in conjunction with your DPSs burst skills (more information on this later on) and burn phases; the first forced enrage, the second enrage and either third if it’s a slower party or fourth if it’s fast and tank forces it.
Contagion and burst skills should be timed with burn phases, this is generally when the boss enrages and the tank uses his support buff (Adrenaline Rush for Lancer). You’ll tend to start off with Contagion as the first enrage is forced by the tank most of the time. Your aim is to maximize DPS output by support and therefore effective play would be timing your Contagion and Awakened: Thrall of Wrath with DPS specific burst skills, the tanks support when the boss enrages (which actives DPS increase damage against enraged bosses). Glyphs: Glyph of Lingering: Longer duration on Contagion means more DPS for the party. Contagion
Cast time: 1 second
MP cost: 750
Cooldown: 2 minutes
Infects one target within 18m with Infection. This target cannot be purified. Infected target’s Endurance is reduced by 5% and they spread a disease that deals 15086 damage per second. Players take less damage and recover fewer HP. Using this skill does not automatically start combat status. (5) Glyph of Lingering : Increases effect duration by 20%
(4) Glyph of Lingering : [Master] Increases effect duration by 20% Infects one target within 18m with Infection. This target cannot be purified. Infected target’s Endurance is reduced by 5% and they spread a disease that deals 15086 damage per second. Players take less damage and recover fewer HP. Using this skill does not automatically start combat status.: Increases effect duration by 20% Core Volley of Curses Skill Usage: Your most important offensive debuff. It’s applies a 10% endurance debuff on the target when glyphed (see Glyph of Enfeeblement), which is a huge DPS increase for your party. Aim to keep this up 100%. Glyphs: Glyph of Lingering: This skill has a short cast time and lasts for a long duration. Glyph of Influence:: MP shouldn’t be an issue. Glyph of Multiplicative: This skill locks onto 4 targets, usually you will only need to lock onto one (the boss) – therefore there is no need for an extra lock on. Glyph of Enfeeblement:: This applies a 10% endurance debuff on a target which will increase your parties DPS by a lot. You should aim to keep this up 100%, it is a must have glyph. Volley of Curses X
Cast time: 1 second
MP cost: 163
Cooldown: 5 seconds
Base Damage: 2685
Inflict a curse that does 1,238 damage every 2 seconds for 10 seconds. Effect stacks up to three times. Does less damage to other players. Press the skill button once and mouse over to lock on to 4 targets within 18m, then press the skill button again or left-click to curse all targets. (5) Glyph of Lingering : Increases effect duration by 20%
(3) Glyph of Influence : Reduces MP cost of Volley of Curses by 33 for a few seconds
(3) Glyph of Multiplication : Increases number of lock-on targets by 1
(2) Glyph of Influence : [Master] Reduces MP cost of Volley of Curses by 33 for a few seconds
(4) Glyph of Enfeeblement : [Master] Decreases target’s Endurance by 10% for 21 seconds
(3) Glyph of Enfeeblement : [Rare] Decreases target’s Endurance by 10% for 21 seconds Inflict a curse that does 1,238 damage every 2 seconds for 10 seconds. Effect stacks up to three times. Does less damage to other players. Press the skill button once and mouse over to lock on to 4 targets within 18m, then press the skill button again or left-click to curse all targets.: Increases effect duration by 20%: Reduces MP cost of Volley of Curses by 33 for a few seconds: Increases number of lock-on targets by 1 Noctenium infusion effect: Increases effect duration-consumes 1 noctenium infusion each time this skill Core Teleport Jaunt Skill Usage: This is your main escape, or iframe skill. Teleport Jaunt will always teleport you in the direction your character is facing. The iframe part is quite short. You want this to have a low cooldown to use it often – hence wherever possible you should opt for cooldown reduction on Teleport Jaunt. Glyphs: Glyph of Blaze: The cast time is pretty fast anyway, this Glyph isn’t really needed. Glyph of Energy: This the cooldown on your only escape is being reduced, which is a pretty decent thing. Teleport Jaunt
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 120
Cooldown: 7 seconds
Teleport a short distance in the direction the camera faces. (This wrong, it is the direction of your character). (4) Glyph of Blaze : Speeds casting of Arun’s Vitae by 25% for a few seconds.
(4) Glyph of Blaze : Speeds casting of Thrall of Life by 25% for a few seconds.
(3) Glyph of Energy : Decreases cooldown by 15%.
(2) Glyph of Energy : [Master] Decreases cooldown by 15%.
(2) Glyph of Energy : [Master] Decreases cooldown by 20%. Teleport a short distance in the direction the camera faces. (This wrong, it is the direction of your character).: Speeds casting of Arun’s Vitae by 25% for a few seconds.: Speeds casting of Thrall of Life by 25% for a few seconds.: Decreases cooldown by 15%. Core Awakened Mass Teleport Skill Usage: Mass Teleport is an awakened support skill which is a clone of Teleport Jaunt with an added effect of taking up to 4 party members up to you. No one expects you to use this to save other people, it’s quite buggy, so use it for your own survival. It has a slightly longer iframe duration than normal jaunt but has a drastically increase cooldown. Mass Teleport
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 120
Cooldown: 30 seconds
Teleport yourself and up to 4 nearby group members. Teleport yourself and up to 4 nearby group members. Core Corruption Ring Skill Usage: This is a secondary way of giving Mana back. It’s a two part skill, with the first dealing damage and then using it again to give out Mana. The damage you do is proportionate to the Mana given out. It is then further divided upon how many players are in the Mana circle (and amount given is different for each class). You are immune to Stagger, Knockdown and Stun during cast. You will not be put into combat. When paired with the Grounding glyph, this is a good skill to tank incoming attacks when your iframe is down. Glyphs: Glyph of Influence: You don’t need MP reduction, waste of points. Glyph of Spirit: As this is your secondary way of giving MP, the investment may not be worth it. Glyph of Grounding: This reduces incoming damage by 50% during casting, this allows you to survive and save Teleport Jaunt. Corruption Ring X
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 625
Cooldown: 15 seconds
Basage Damage: 1,847
Drain HP from targets within 6m, storing it as spiritual energy. The HP absorbed is proportional to how long you channel the ring. Use the Infusion Ring skill to release the stored energy as MP to up to 20 group members within 16m. Immune to knockdown, stun, and stagger while casting. (3) Glyph of Influence : Reduces MP cost of Arun’s Tears by 100 for a few seconds.
(4) Glyph of Grounding : Reduces damage taken by 50% while casting.
(3) Glyph of Spirit : Increases MP replenishment by 50%.
(3) Glyph of Grounding : [Master] Reduces damage taken by 50% while casting. Drain HP from targets within 6m, storing it as spiritual energy. The HP absorbed is proportional to how long you channel the ring. Use the Infusion Ring skill to release the stored energy as MP to up to 20 group members within 16m. Immune to knockdown, stun, and stagger while casting.: Reduces MP cost of Arun’s Tears by 100 for a few seconds.: Reduces damage taken by 50% while casting.: Increases MP replenishment by 50%. Core Retaliate Skill Usage: Pretty much for when you get knocked down. Glyphs: Glyph of Power: You won’t ever use this skill to actually damage… right? Glyph of Energy:: This glyph is situational, you most likely will never need it. However some dungeons, such as Abcess are quite big on knockdowns where it may come in handy. Glyph of Balance: Never used it, balance isn’t that good. Glyph of Opportunity:: This glyph is situational, you most likely will never need it. However some dungeons, such as Abcess are quite big on knockdowns where it may come in handy. Retaliate X
Cast time: Instant
Cooldown: 15 seconds
Base Damage: 1276
Leap to your feet while attacking your target. You can use this skill only when knocked down. You become briefly immune to knockdown, stagger and stuns. (4) Glyph of Power : Increases skill damage by 25%
(4) Glyph of Energy : Decreases cooldown by 20%.
(3) Glyph of Opportunity : [Master] Eliminates the cooldown of Teleport Jaunt.
(2) Glyph of Balance : [Master] Increases balance by 500% for 2 seconds.
(2) Glyph of Opportunity : [Master] Eliminates the cooldown of Teleport Jaunt. Leap to your feet while attacking your target. You can use this skill only when knocked down. You become briefly immune to knockdown, stagger and stuns.: Increases skill damage by 25%: Decreases cooldown by 20%. Core Titanic Favor Skill Usage: This is your main heal, previously it had a heal over time, now it’s a powerful fixed heal. Like cleansing, you should aim to pre-lock or predictive heal your party members. Glyphs: Glyph of Multiplication: This skill only allows you to lock on 2 people. In a 5 man party, you can heal everyone with the glyph. Glyph of Longshot: You shouldn’t be so far away where this is needed. If you find yourself using or relying on this glyph, you need to revaluate your gameplay. Titanic Favor IX
Cast time: 1 second
MP cost: 400
Cooldown: 2.5 seconds
Immediately heal up to 2 allies for 3637 HP. Press the skill button once and mouse over to lock on up to 2 group members within 19m, then press the skill button again or left-click to heal all targets. (2) Glyph of Multiplication : Increases number of lock-on targets by 2
(4) Glyph of Longshot : Increases range by 3 meters
(3) Glyph of Longshot : [Master] Increases range by 3 meters
(2) Glyph of Longshot : [Rare] Increases range by 5 meters Immediately heal up to 2 allies for 3637 HP. Press the skill button once and mouse over to lock on up to 2 group members within 19m, then press the skill button again or left-click to heal all targets.: Increases number of lock-on targets by 2: Increases range by 3 meters Noctenium infusion effect: Increases healing-consumes 1 noctenium infusion each time this skill Core Damage Boomerang Pulse Skill Usage: This skill is your best heal. It has a forward and rebound heal. It’s an easy skill to throw out at the back of the boss to hit the back DPSers. You can also throw it through the boss and hit the tank. Since it’s a rebound skill, you can always move and position yourself so that the rebounding orb travels through the person you didn’t get when you threw it. Glyphs: Glyph of Brilliance: I don’t use any other MP glyphs other than this one. Purely because you tend to use this skill a lot and the 225 MP does stack up. Without the glyph, 750 MP is a lot to consume. If you’re fine without this glyph, then feel free to spend the points elsewhere. (4) Glyph of Energy: Using your only other heal more frequently is pretty nice. With cooldown reduction it brings it down to 5 seconds. Boomerang Pulse
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 750
Cooldown: 8 seconds
Base Damage: 3301
Fire a rebounding bolt which damages all enemies in it’s path, and also heals party members in it’s path by 2439 (modified by your heal bonus). Using this skill does not automatically start combat status. (3) Glyph of Brilliance : Reduces MP cost by 225
(4) Glyph of Energy : Decrease cooldown by 20%
(3) Glyph of Energy : [Master] Decrease cooldown by % Fire a rebounding bolt which damages all enemies in it’s path, and also heals party members in it’s path by 2439 (modified by your heal bonus). Using this skill does not automatically start combat status.: Reduces MP cost by 225: Decrease cooldown by 20% Core Warding Totem Skill Usage: This a good skill to passively heal the party, especially when they’re spread out. This skill has a hidden shield of 7145 and last for 5 seconds, it sadly doesn’t give you immunity to knockdowns, staggers or stuns. In addition, Warding Totem has a 0.5 second vulnerability state – when you cast the skill, it can receive damage for about half a second (maybe even shorter). This can be good or bad – if it gets hit hard, it’ll die, or it can act as another entity to take a debuff or soak up shared damage (like a thrall). In addition, when active it’ll increase healing effects of Titanic Favour and Boomerang Pulse. Glyphs: Glyph of Brilliance: This shouldn’t cause you MP issues. Glyph of Restoration: It’s a decent amount of HP which stacks up, you will need to use this skill a lot to make it worth it however. If you feel like you don’t, then either use it or spend the points somewhere else. Warding Totem II
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 600
Cooldown: 25 seconds
Summons a totem 10m in front of you which casts a warding effect on allies within 20m and restores 7000 HP every 2 seconds. The totem lasts for 10 seconds. (3) Glyph of Brilliance : Decrease MP consumption by 300
(3) Glyph of Restoration : [Master] Increases HP regeneration by 20%
(3) Glyph of Restoration : [Rare] Increases HP regeneration by 25% Summons a totem 10m in front of you which casts a warding effect on allies within 20m and restores 7000 HP every 2 seconds. The totem lasts for 10 seconds.: Decrease MP consumption by 300 Core Arun’s Cleansing Touch Skill Usage: This is your cleanse, it’s quite fast but you will need to lock on to players so prelocking/predictive cleansing is vital in tough situations. It will also cleanse yourself. Glyphs: Glyph of Multiplication: This skill only can lock up to 3 players normally, you have at least 4 people to lock on in a normal party, even more in a 7 or 10 man. Therefore this glyph is needed for dungeons which may require everyone to be cleansed. Arun’s Cleansing Touch
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 400
Cooldown: 2.5 seconds
Purge all harmful effects from your allies. Press the skill button once and mouse over to lock on up to 3 group members within 19m, then press the skill button again or left-click to purge all targets. (2) Glyph of Multiplication : Increases number of lock-on targets by 2
(1) Glyph of Multiplication : [Master] Increases number of lock-on targets by 2 Purge all harmful effects from your allies. Press the skill button once and mouse over to lock on up to 3 group members within 19m, then press the skill button again or left-click to purge all targets.: Increases number of lock-on targets by 2 Core Resurrect Skill Usage: This skill pretty much does what it says, it resurrects a dead player. I will say this, I have encountered so many Mystics who die when they attempt to Resurrect – your timing is important, don’t risk yourself and keep your eyes on the boss at all times. Also face the boss, most of you should have a chest roll which reduces frontal damage, so face the boss to tank the damage if need be. Glyphs: Glyph of Brilliance: You shouldn’t be using this skill too often, even so, MP can be returned – not worth the points. Glyph of Energy: You never know when multiple DPS will die from a mechanic, your job is to quickly get them back into the fight. Glyph of Haste: Resurrect is one of the slowest animations out there, so anything to speed it up and make you less vulnerable is good. Glyph of Heartening: Resurrecting people with 100% HP and MP means they can get back into the fight quickly, let’s not be selfish. Resurrect
Cast time: 7 seconds
MP cost: 1700
Cooldown: 20 seconds
When a dead group members lie within 4m, you can restore life to the nearest one. (3) Glyph of Brilliance : Reduces MP cost by 510
(5) Glyph of Energy : Decreases cooldown by 50%
(5) Glyph of Haste : Speeds casting by 40%
(4) Glyph of Haste : [Master] Speeds casting by 40%
(4) Glyph of Heartening : [Master] Resurrects a target and sets their stamina to 120
(4) Glyph of Energy : [Master] Decreases cooldown by 50% When a dead group members lie within 4m, you can restore life to the nearest one.: Reduces MP cost by 510: Decreases cooldown by 50%: Speeds casting by 40% Core Vow of Rebirth Skill Usage: This is your second life. Try and maintain Vow of Rebirth, as if you do die – you can get back up. Play safer if you haven’t got it and cast it as soon as you can. Getting people who don’t already have Vow or a passive is a bonus. Glyphs: Glyph of Energy: A good glyph to have, this reduces the skills cooldown by a lot, giving you more seconds lifes and more party survivability. (1) Glyph of Altruism: To make this skill work for yourself, you need this glyph, otherwise it’s just a resurrect for the target. (3) Glyph of Longshot: We’ve never had issues of the close range cast, now that Vow is somewhat ranged, I don’t think this glyph would be needed. (3) Glyph of Multiplication: This glyph is interesting and may be handy, allowing you to cast upon more than one target. An experience party which doesn’t die as much may not need this. (We’ve done fine without it in the past). Vow of Rebirth
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 250
Cooldown: 15 minutes
Form a pact between you and a group member, who will resurrect if killed in the next 20 minutes. Press the skill button once and mouse over to lock on a group member within 18m, then press the skill button again or left-click to form a pact with the target. (3) Glyph of Energy : Decrease cooldown by 40%
(2) Glyph of Altruism : Caster receives effect of Vow of Rebirth when used on another target
(2) Glyph of Energy : [Master] Decrease cooldown by 40%
(1) Glyph of Altruism : [Master] Caster receives effect of Vow of Rebirth when used on another target
(3) Glyph of Longshot : [Master] Increases range by 3 meters
(3) Glyph of Multiplication : [Rare] Increases number of lock-on targets by 1 Form a pact between you and a group member, who will resurrect if killed in the next 20 minutes. Press the skill button once and mouse over to lock on a group member within 18m, then press the skill button again or left-click to form a pact with the target.: Decrease cooldown by 40%: Caster receives effect of Vow of Rebirth when used on another target Core Regression Skill Usage: This is your dispel, some boss mechanics require you to use this skill, for example Runious Manor or Dreadspire. The boss will gain a buff which must be removed in a certain time period. Glyphs: Glyph of Energy: Nowadays healers should have enough cooldown reduction to be able to have this skill up for the next time they need it for a boss without this glyph. Regression II
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 1000
Cooldown: 1 minute
End all beneficial effects on enemy targets within a 8 min radius of you. (4) Glyph of Energy : Decreases cooldown by 25% End all beneficial effects on enemy targets within a 8 min radius of you.: Decreases cooldown by 25% Core Aura of the Merciless and Aura of the Tenacious and These auras are the important ones for PvE. The Aura of the Tenacious will provide Mana support for your party. The Aura of Merciless is the biggest damage boost you can contribute to your party, it will increase Crit Factor by 2.2 and applies Titanic Wrath to surrounding party members (30m). Titanic Wrath is a 48 Power and 9.6% Attack Speed buff, however it can be overwritten by Energy Stars. Aura of the Merciless
Grants Titanic Wrath III and Titanic Fury II to you and your allies within 30m. Costs 30 MP every 2 seconds to maintain. Cannot be used with Aura of the Swift. [Titanic Wrath III] Increases Power by 48. Increases Attack Speed by 9.6.
[Titanic Fury II] Increases Crit Factor by 2.2 times. Aura of the Tenacious
An aura emanates within 30m of you, restoring 20 MP to all other group members every second. Drains 30 MP every 2 seconds while active. Cannot be used with Aura of the Unyielding. Damage Sharan Bolt Skill Usage: A filler attack when dealing damage. Glyphs: : Glyph of Power: No use for healing. Sharan Bolt XII
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 32 32 32 32
Base Damage: 609 609 609 609 Unleash a bolt of Sharan Energy at a single target up to 18m away. Unleash a bolt of Sharan Energy at a single target up to 18m away. PVP: Reduced damage at max distance. (3) Glyph of Power : Increase skill damage by 25%. : Increase skill damage by 25%. Damage Metaphoric Blast Skill Usage: A quick burst of decent melee AoE damage, meaning good for Mystic DPS. It speeds the casting of Metamorphic Smite when chained. Glyphs: Glyph of Power: If you are hybrid DPSing/ healing, or need extra support for mob phases this is a nice glyph to dish out extra damage. Glyph of Persistence: If you are hybrid DPSing/ healing, or need extra support for mob phases this is a nice glyph to dish out extra damage. Metaphoric Blast XI
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 163
Cooldown: 1.5 seconds
Base Damage: 1,197 Project a cone of divine energy that damages nearby enemies.
Activates faster after using Metamorphic Smite. (5) Glyph of Power : Increases skill damage by 25%.
(3) Glyph of Power : [Master] Increases skill damage by 40%
(4) Glyph of Persistence : 50% chance to eliminate cooldown. Project a cone of divine energy that damages nearby enemies.Activates faster after using Metamorphic Smite.: Increases skill damage by 25%.: 50% chance to eliminate cooldown. Noctenium infusion effect: Increases damage-consumes 1 noctenium infusion each time this skill is used. Damage Metaphoric Smite Skill Usage: A quick burst of decent melee AoE damage, meaning good for Mystic DPS when solo. It speeds the casting of Metamorphic Blast when chained. This is your knockdown skill as a Mystic. Glyphs: Glyph of Energy: Not really useful for party play, as if you ever need to DPS something, you should be able to do so without glyphs (Arunic Release, or Volley, Boomerang, Smite and Blast). Glyph of Influence: Not useful in party play and solo play. MP can be supplied in many ways. Glyph of Haste: See above. Metaphoric Smite XI
Cast time: 1 second
MP cost: 250
Cooldown: 5 seconds
Base Damage: 2,133 Damage targets within 5 meters, and has a chance to knock them down. Activates faster if used after Metamorphic Blast. (3) Glyph of Energy : Decrease skill cooldown by 20%.
(4) Glyph of Influence : Reduce MP cost of Metamorphic Blast by 41 for a few seconds
(4) Glyph of Haste : Increases casting speed by 25% Damage targets within 5 meters, and has a chance to knock them down. Activates faster if used after Metamorphic Blast.: Decrease skill cooldown by 20%.: Reduce MP cost of Metamorphic Blast by 41 for a few seconds: Increases casting speed by 25% Noctenium infusion effect: Increases damage-consumes 1 noctenium infusion each time this skill is used. Damage Awakened Thrall Lord Skill Usage: Thrall Lord is an awakened DPS skill which summons the Thrall Lord and deals immense damage, try to pop this off when possible, however it will be replaced by the use of any other thrall. Summon: Thrall Lord
Cast time: Instant
MP cost: 1,075
Cooldown: 10 minutes
Base Damage: 16,000
Summon the Thrall Lord in front of you, which deals damage to nearby enemies. Summon the Thrall Lord in front of you, which deals damage to nearby enemies. Summon: Thrall Lord cannot be used in the Civil Unrest area. Summoning a Thrall of Vengeance or Thrall of Wrath will cancel Thrall Lord. Other Mana Infusion Skill Usage: This is an okay way to get passive mana if you are not doing anything. This skill has a very long cast time and it ends upon entering combat. Usually better to just pop a mana pot instead. Glyphs: : Glyph of Spirit: You don’t really need this as you won’t be using this skill a lot and it isn’t worth 5 points. Glyph of Haste: You don’t really need this as you won’t be using this skill a lot. Mana Infusion
Cast time: 4.5 seconds
Cooldown: 10 seconds You regain 100 MP every 1 second for 20 seconds. Ends if you take damage or use a combat skill or item. (5) Glyph of Spirit : Increases MP regeneration by 20%
(3) Glyph of Haste : Increases casting speed by 25%. You regain 100 MP every 1 second for 20 seconds. Ends if you take damage or use a combat skill or item.: Increases MP regeneration by 20%: Increases casting speed by 25%. Other Aura of the Swift and Aura of the Unyielding These auras are the less important ones for PvE. The Aura of the Swift will provide movement speed (works in combat too). The Aura of the Unyielding offers Crit Factor Resistance, which is more of a PvP thing. Aura of the Swift
An aura emanates within 30m of you, increasing group members’ movement speed by 30%. Drains 30 MP every 2 seconds while active. Cannot be used with Aura of the Merciless. An aura emanates within 30m of you, increasing group members’ movement speed by 30%. Drains 30 MP every 2 seconds while active. Cannot be used with Aura of the Merciless. Aura of the Unyielding
An aura emanates within 30m of you, increasing group members’ Crit Resist Factor by 40%. Drains 30 MP every 2 seconds while active. Cannot be used with Aura of the Tenacious. An aura emanates within 30m of you, increasing group members’ Crit Resist Factor by 40%. Drains 30 MP every 2 seconds while active. Cannot be used with Aura of the Tenacious. Other Crowd Control Skills: These skills are pretty much useless for PvE – they are the Mystic’s crowd control skills. Most crowd control does not work for PvE bosses, unless there are mechanics which require you to stun the boss, so you may use Shara’s Lash. In addition, you can use crowd control skills on normal monsters/adds to help ease the fight, such as stunning/fearing/sleeping Archers, for example. These skills are: – Sonorous Dreams
– Mire
– Ancient Binding
– Curse of Confusion
– Shara’s Lash (Although useful in certain situations)
– Curse of Confusion
Talents
Patch coming soon: 13th Novemeber 2018 – Guide will be updated within the next few weeks.
Gameplay
There is not a set rotation when it comes to healing, instead there is a list of tasks – some have priority over others. When starting off as a Mystic, ensure that you tackle this list in order. Your aim is to be able to do all of the following things efficiently:
Before the Fight:
When you enter an instance and before engaging a battle, you should turn on Auras (Crit and MP), Thrall Augmentation, cast Thrall of Protection for the endurance buff, use Vow of Rebirth on a party member and use your consumables (Bravery Potion, Everful Nostrum (Battle Nostrum) and Noctenium)
Mystic Gameplay:
As a healer you are expected to survive, heal, support your DPS via buffs and MP, debuff the boss and carry out specific mechanics/call them out. A lot of people say that you matter more than the party, because if you die, then the party dies. That’s kind of true, however your party matters – their DPS matters. TERA is a DPS race at the end of the day and healing isn’t relatively hard, so supporting the DPS by healing them through damage or optimizing their DPS output is just as equally important.
Surviving: #1 Priority
Survival involves you being alert, standing in the right place and healing yourself. Mystic is pretty good at surviving, we’re out of combat majority of the time so you can essentially run from danger. If you have to iframe, or quickly escape then you have both Teleport Jaunt and Mass Teleport. If those are down, then you have Corruption Ring (if it’s glyphed) to halve incoming damage.
Mystic involves a lot of predictive play, you can use this to your advantage with Arun’s Vitae, Thrall of Life and Warding Totem. You can pop these if you know there’s incoming damage, you can pick your motes too. There’s always Healing Potions for emergencies.
If you do fall, resurrect when it’s safe and follow the before the fight steps, making sure you pop your Auras and Vow of Rebirth.
Healing and Mana: #2 Priority
Healing is simple, again, predictive approach. You need to learn a boss’s attack, specifically their stuns. You should pre-lock and cleanse (or heal if it’s damage) whilst being at a safe distance, that way if anyone does get stunned you can limit their downtime to almost zero.
Mana is something you should keep an eye on, specifically the tank’s MP. Try and top it up when it’s under 50%, you can use Arunic Release on nearby motes, Corruption Ring and Awakened: Thrall of Life.
Mechanics (Goes with with Healing and Mana)
There are times where the boss will do mechanics, such as the stuns for example. Like I said, you need to learn these and not just to avoid them – you should learn them to be able to proactively fix things as soon as they occur.
Another example is knockdowns, staggers and pushbacks. Bosses tend to hit back at the DPS, staggering or pushing them back which can interrupt skills, putting them on cooldown. Learn these attacks and use your Awakened: Thrall of Protection to prevent it.
There are also healer specific mechanics, which a guide will tell you about, so just be aware!
DPS Support:
This is probably what makes and breaks a good Mystic, supporting your DPS through buffs at efficient times. Up times of your buffs are important – I’ve listed a rough guide on what you should aim at. There’s no way to legit tell how well you’ve done other than Third Party Software, which EME does not support. Therefore, I can’t recommend it – use at your own risk. There are 2 levels of DPS support you can give:
Overall Support: You’ll be doing this throughout the fight, not at specific times – so off cooldown.
Volley of Curses : This is the one which should be kept up at all times. It has a Glyph of Enfeeblement which reduces Endurance by 10%. Aim for 100% uptime, you’ll get use to casting it passively without realising, which is a good thing. The Aim
– 98-100% : Excellent!
– 95-98% : Good!
– 90-95% : Decent!
– Below 90% : Needs work, 90%+ is easily obtainable.
Awakened: Thrall of Vengeance : This is your enhanced Thrall of Vengeance, which gives your party 15 Power for 12 seconds (if they’re in range). Try and get everyone in the circle, if you have ranged classes which are playing far, then it might be wise to give them priority. The cooldown of this skill is 16 seconds with your cooldown reduction, meaning that there’s downtime of 25%. You should use it off cooldown to maximise the uptime of it. The Aim
– 65-75% : Excellent!
– 60-65% : Good!
– 50-60% : Decent!
– Below 50% : Needs work, 50%+ is easily obtainable.
Burn Phase Support:
Contagion : I’ve already touched on this, but to quote myself: Contagion applies an addition 5% endurance debuff for 20 seconds. This can be increased to 29/30 seconds with Noctentium and Lingering glyph.
Awakened: Thrall of Wrath : This follows Contagion , it increases your party members’ Crit Power by 0.6 for 20 seconds (in range).
Uptime is not the focus; using them at the correct times is. Your party should use their burn skills are specific times during the fight, for most of the time this is when the boss enrages , and (if you have one) when the Lancer uses Adrenaline Rush . The combination of these two, alongside the DPS’s own burn skills allows them to use high damaging skills quickly and rapidly – thus contributing to a lot of damage. Your goal is to make your members stronger and the boss weaker during those phases by buffing them with Awakened: Thrall of Wrath and debuffing the boss with Contagion . Quick Tip about Enrages : Most 99% of bosses enrage at 90% naturally, and majority of the time the Tank will force the enrage (using Infuriate ), to make it occur at 100%. Enrages last for 36 seconds and the boss will re-enrage throughout when sufficient damage has been dealt after an enrage phase as ended. In simple terms, the boss re-enrages when the party deals 10% after the the boss un-eranges.
It’s important for you to note this as you need to know when the enrage phase is coming and whether it’s the first, second, third, forced, etc enrage phase – as it will correlate to the DPS’s burn phase.
In the simplest of scenarios, you’ll use Contagion and Awakened: Thrall of Wrath every enrage, or aim for it. So at the start, you’ll use both (With Contagion and Contagion), then when the next enrage comes, you’ll use it again, etc. That will look something like this:
However you’ll soon find out that due to cooldowns of your own, DPS and Lancer’s skills don’t fully match up so there are variations, there is also the possibility that the Tank will force another enrage mid-fight. When the party deals more damage, you won’t be able to use it every enrage. You may be able to use it for the first, second and find Contagion is not up for the third – in this scenario you may be forced to skip the third enrage. Your tank should also not be able to use Adrenaline Rush, so if they’re experienced they should force enrage it after the third ends, causing a forced burn phase (Burn Phase – 3), allowing you to use your skills here instead. So your fight may look something like this:
Take note that in a fast party, Adrenaline Rush may still not be up for the start of Burn Phase – 2, therefore it might be wise to keep an eye out for when the Lancer uses it so you can sync up.
Tips
Resurrecting
Most Mystics die when they’re trying to resurrect. You are expected to resurrect the DPS as soon as possible so they’re not out of the fight for long, but mechanics and other things can delay that. If you know your DPS is going to die (wrong debuff), you can pre-cast res, if they’re “dead” and in the circle when the resurrect animation ends, they’ll get it.
Always keep an eye on the boss and face the boss – a lot of people turn around or face a different way, if you followed the gear guide then you should have a roll which reduces frontal attack damage, so take advantage of it. You should also know your boss, some attacks might knock you down, so you may want to cast Awakened: Thrall of Protection or use a Sky Lotus Drink for the anti-stagger and knockdown. In addition, you can also use your Brooch (if it’s Quatre or Marrow), or Lein’s Dark Root Beer to speed up the resurrect animation.
Additionally, skills which don’t require a lock on such as Boomerang Pulse and Awakened: Thrall of Life can still heal or cleanse a player while they’re standing up. Normally, you cannot lock onto a player in the resurrect animation. This can help if they chose a bad time to resurrect.
Animation Locks
Animation lock is when you are stuck in a skills animation, unable to cancel it until it’s over (try it yourself with Titanic Favor), therefore knowing when to use your skills in a safe position is crucial. Don’t put yourself at more risk by casting Resurrect as a boss is about to jump on you. Attack Speed decreases the animation lock, hence why I like an Attack Speed build.
Playing Actively and Predicting
You have one short iframe and one pretty long, Teleport Jaunt is a short cooldown, but there are times where a boss might target you in succession. Learn the boss’s mechanics thoroughly as it will help you decide what to use your iframe on. You may you need to dodge/absorb some of the other attacks by walking/running out of danger with Out-of-Combat Play or your Swift Crystal, using Corruption Ring‘s Glyph of Grounding to reduce the incoming damage, or by taking the damage and counteracting with self-healing and consumables.
Being a predictive healer allows you to make judgements beforehand. If the boss is going to swipe at your DPS then it is only wise pre-lock Titanic Favour and complete the cast just as the damage occurs, so that it heals your group up quickly with no downtime. Similarly, if the bosses attack is going to debuff you or your party members, then you can pre-lock on your cleanse, drop an Arun’s Vitae to pick up, or cast Thrall of Life to counteract the curse as soon as possible.
Again, some attacks will knock you or your group down, luckily you can Corruption Ring or Awakened: Thrall of Life. There are so many ways to counteract a situation and doing it beforehand gives you more control over the situation.
Know Your Enemy
It’s important to know what you’re fighting by knowing its mechanics and have a rough note on its attack pattern. This will help you make judgement calls and increase your survivability. For example, if a melee player dies under the boss, know when it’ll be frontal attacking the tank for a few seconds, so you can cast Resurrect instead of blindly doing and having to cancel.
Bosses in TERA are programmed to do set mechanics, in set patterns, with a set time. Think of the boss as a player, it’s attacks (skills) have a cool down period and it has a set rotation – however bosses aren’t that smart; AI wise, a lot of mechanics happen by % of their health and then on a timer, so after a while you’ll have a feel for when a major mechanic might occur.
What are it’s tells (how do I know he’s doing this mechanic)? Does this attack deal fatal damage? Can I survive with Corruption Ring? Can I run out of it? Can I run out of it if I’m in combat? Can I position myself to avoid this attack? If so, what position do I need to get to? Do I need to use Teleport Jaunt for this attack?
These are the questions you should consider however you don’t literally have to write these out and answer them, it’s just mental pairing of a mechanic with something to counteract it – you all do it without realising. By breaking down it’s mechanics and matching them up with a way to counteract it, you’ll be able to survive each mechanic when they appear. It’s important that you look at your tools and their cooldowns, because if you’re thinking you can just Teleport Jaunt every mechanic… well you might be able to sometimes, but what happens if things are consecutive with no down time?
Positioning and Out-of-Combat Play
A good point to make is positioning- sadly, each boss is different however the general rule is “don’t stand too close where you’re taking a lot of damage if you’re not comfortable and don’t stand too far so that close-range mechanics and healing becomes difficult”. Find your comfort zone and the area which is easiest for you to be based on the boss’s attacks. On side? North Earth, North West? Does this boss do back swings, side swings? Try and eliminate attacks thrown at you by standing in areas where they won’t hit you. Standing at a comfortable distance allows you to out run mechanics, you shouldn’t be in combat – you are free to run around and a fast pace.
An important point is, don’t stand behind the boss – Bosses will a healer specific attack, or at least a range attack on the further player, which should be you most of the time. Therefore, if you stand at the back, the boss will do a 180 every so often which causes the whole party to reposition. Try to at least stand on the side.
Using Thralls and Warding Totem as entities
A hidden Mystic talent is the ability to use thralls as entities. They act as players, meaning they can help with certain mechanics which:
– a) deal fixed amount of damage which is shared by the players within the damage area
– b) apply a curse which is applied to the closest (or furthest) players. Note: This is not the case for newer bosses, depends on the fight, refer to a guide.
The addition of a thrall reduces the damage each individual player gets as the damage is shared with an extra “player”. Thralls which take curses, instead of players, allows players to continue to DPS without worrying
about the curses effect and makes the run easier. The only two thralls which are viable are Thrall of Vengeance and Thrall of Protection, as they take damage and are on a shorter cool. However, since they are used for other things (buffs and support), this may pose an issue – so I don’t believe this is expected.
Warding Totem has the same concept, meaning you can share the damage even further, or take up to 2 curses for your party. However, the timing on Warding Totem is harder to master, as it only has about 0.5~ seconds of vulnerability, after this it is immune to damage and effects. You want it to appear as the curse/damage is taking effect.
Consumables
As I’ve said many times, even though you’re a Mystic who can heal, it is wise to use Consumables to better your gameplay. There are several types of consumables, such as Core, Situational and Luxury.
Core Everful Nostrum / Battle Solution If you are a returning player, this consumable replaces campfire charms, battle nostrums and onslaught scrolls. This is a must use consumable, as it gives endurance, MP regen in combat, attack speed, cooldown reduction and more.
Core Healing Potions You can heal yourself through consumables, there are a couple of healing potions: Your normal Healing Potion which heal you instantly for a set amount. I prefer the instant heal over the Elixir. Then you have additional ones which share the cooldown of 30 seconds, these are Health Potion which heals you for 50% of your max HP instantly (check before you purchase, there’s two items with identical names) and Rejuvenation Potion which heals you for 5% of your max HP up to 75% every 1 second for 15 seconds. Even as a healer, using Potions is essential for those sticky situations and multitasking.
Situational Mana Potions You can gain mana through consumables, there are a couple of mana potions: Your normal Mana Potion which give mana instantly for a set amount. I prefer the instant mana over the Elixir for a quick burst when needed. Then you have additional ones such as Sarberry Deliciousness which give you 170 mana every 1 second for 15 seconds and Divine Infusion which gives 5% of your max MP up to 75% every 1 second for 15 seconds. Mana mangement is important, and potions can be a way to quickly replenish yourself in sticky situations.
Core Goddess Blessings These allow you to resurrect on the spot if you fall in combat, they are good to use to save the party or during burn phases where the DPS cannot resurrect you. They have a 1 hour cooldown. You should always have 1 in your inventory, just in case you fall without Vow of Rebirth.
Core Bravery Potion This increases your Attack Speed by 4% (6%), Damage by 10% (12%) and Defense by 10% for 30 minutes. These are good for general game play, the attack speed allows for less animation lock and the defensive part can save you. They are purchasable from merchants.
Situational Noctenium These increase effects on selected skills, you can check the skills above to see what skills have Noctenium Effects and what they do. I do highly recommend Mystics to use Noctenium since it increases Contagion duration, speeds up Ressurect cast time, and increases your healing. If your DPS is spending their noctenium, you should too as it’ll benefit them as well.
Luxury Roostock Food There are different types of Roostock Food and they can be beneficial Mystics. Sky Lotus offers resistance to knockdown and stagger for 10 seconds, good for when you’re trying to resurrect someone. Lein’s Dark Root Beer offers increased Attack Speed by 20 for 10 seconds, against good for when you’re trying to resurrect someone quickly.
Future Updates, Credits and Revision History |
Who's The Client State Here?
By Paula Gordon
August 18, 2015 " Information Clearing House " - 22 Democratic and 36 Republican members of Congress spent a full week of the August recess in Israel rather than among the constituents they were elected to serve. Their junkets are sponsored by neo-cons and other hawks, Israeli and American, who are intent on killing a hard-won deal to keep Iran from getting nuclear weapons. Do these Congresspeople think that we won't notice simply because it's August?
Why aren't these Representatives at home listening to the real needs of Americans, needs which will not be served by American involvement in another disastrous Middle East war? They appear not to care that they were elected to serve America's best interests, which are not those of Israel's unfailingly belligerent Netanyahu nor of America's homegrown war profiteers and chicken hawks.
These particular (bi-annual) junkets are not the "ordinary" kind -- "one taken by an official at public expense." These are the much less savory type of junket -- "one taken by a person who is the guest of a business or agency seeking favor or patronage."
This year's jaunt is particularly egregious. It is a blatant effort to influence (or purchase) the votes of 58 United States Representatives as Congress is about to have its say on the most important peace initiative in the Middle East in decades.
Even more galling, America's taxpayers are footing the bill. Predictably, the host is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Registered lobbyists cannot fund such trips and AIPAC is one such organization. Congress explicitly forbids Members taking trips paid for by lobbyists.
So AIPAC skirts the restrictions (as do an appalling laundry list of others) by having its captive 501(c)(3) tax-exempt American Israel Education Foundation (AIEF) act as "host". Like all 501(c)(3)s, AIEF is both tax-exempt and contributions to it are tax deductible. So we are paying twice for these trips (or three times if you count our annual $3+ Billion foreign aid contribution to Israel). You and I are underwriting the cost of a foreign government aggressively intervening in the creation and execution of American foreign and domestic policy. Who's the client state here?
Israel's Netanyahu consistently has embraced force over diplomacy. Witness how he relished destroying the Oslo accords. Maintaining Israel as the Middle East's sole nuclear armed nation is the most obvious interpretation of his serial intrusions into our domestic politics. AIPAC does what Netanyahu tells it to do. For the past 6+ decades Congress and the Executive Branch have done AIPAC's bidding. Who's the client state?
When the conservative USAToday sees the common sense of the Iran deal -- and the utter void of realistic alternatives beyond all-out war, well-founded skepticism about these junkets stoke the cynicism on which warmongers feed.
Deeply offensive as I find members of Congress allowing themselves to be manipulated by AIPAC, I am heartened that AIPAC is so dramatically over-reaching. Perhaps they see their former strength ebbing away. It is bad etiquette for the puppeteer to allow itself to be seen. The curtain may be lifting on the Wizard.
We must not underestimate AIPAC and their cohort. Mega-donors are spending big bucks to influence the fate of this agreement with Iran. That money comes from 501 (c)(4) tax-exempt sources that don't need to report from whence the money flows. AIPAC's funding is, to be generous, opaque.
I am offended and infuriated by the behavior of AIPAC, the Netanyahu government and American neo-cons (who never met a war they didn't like so long as someone else fights it and pays for it). These new members of Congress may be junketeers, two-timers, clients or naifs. Whichever it is, they are also wrong to publicly compromise their presumed integrity.
When we're paying attention, the people of the United States understand that war in these circumstances is a really bad idea. If your Representative went missing (AWOL actually) this August, ask him or her where they went and why, and how their absence forwarded the interests of your community and your America. |
Alec Baldwin is gaining a lot of attention as the default impressionist for President Trump on "Saturday Night Live." However, he’s now claiming that the first lady, Melania Trump, is a fan of his over-the-top Trump character.
Speaking on Monday’s episode of WNYC’s “The Brian Lehrer Show,” the 59-year-old actor made the bold claim that FLOTUS is into both “SNL” and Baldwin’s impression, despite her husband’s very public insistence that it’s bad.
“Someone told me, who is friends with someone in the White House, or formerly in the White House, that Melania Trump loves ‘SNL’ and she loves my impersonation,” he said, later alleging that Melania believes his portrayal of her husband of 12 years is right on the money.
Unfortunately for the former “30 Rock” star, the first lady’s director of communications, Stephanie Grisham, refuted Baldwin’s claim in an e-mail to Newsweek.
“That is not true, which is why Mr. Baldwin has no actual names to go with his bizarre assertion.”
As The Washington Post notes, Donald Trump has been very vocal about his distaste for the constant parodies of him from the long-running sketch show, and has even commented on Baldwin’s performance directly on Twitter.
“Just tried watching Saturday Night Live - unwatchable!” he said in December of 2016. “Totally biased, not funny and the Baldwin impersonation just can’t get any worse. Sad.” |
Emotional footage of women burning their burqas and men shaving off the beards ISIS forced them to grow has emerged as Syrians celebrated being liberated from Raqqa.
Distraught civilians who were freed from the terrorists' reign of terror in the city in the north of the country could not wait to destroy any association with Islamic State.
Women were captured peeling off the black burqas militants forced them to wear and setting them on fire before cursing the terror group.
While the women were given strict dress codes, men were forced to grow beards which they shaved off as soon as they tasted freedom.
A woman peels off the thick, black burqa she and others were forced to wear by Islamic State
A barber chops off a man's beard which he was forced to grow by ISIS terrorists in Raqqa
The women burned the clothing, sa ying that they hoped Allah would burn the hearts of ISIS terrorists
Two women hug after being freed from the ISIS tyranny in the city of Raqqa in northern Syria
The families in the video were freed from ISIS by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), led by the People's Protection Units (YPG).
In a video released by the YPG, a crying mother tells the camera ISIS killed her father and her husband when they were stood outside the family home.
Another says her father was burned to death by terrorists and one woman, peeling off her burqa, says: 'Burn them. May Allah burn ISIS. They burned my father.
'May these clothes they forced us to wear be damned.
'May Allah but fire on their hearts.'
A Raqqa resident, standing with her son, tells the camera her son was killed by ISIS because he refused to pray and a man says he lost his daughter.
One man in the video is then tended to by a barber, who cuts off his beard with a pair of scissors.
The man being groomed says: 'Cut it all off. Cut it all off just to spite them.'
A woman removes her headscarf, saying her father was burned to death by ISIS and therefore the clothing she was forced to wear by the terror group should be burned
A woman removes her black burqa as she is surrounded by children who were freed by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), led by the People's Protection Units (YPG)
A woman kneels down above the black burqa and sets fire to it after being given a lighter
A Syrian resident smiles as the barber chops off the beard he was forced to grow by ISIS
The operation to liberate Raqqa hit a bit of a roadblock today.
While residents continued to flood out of the city to freedom, advances against the Islamic State group in its stronghold of Raqqa slowed down amid stiff resistance from the militants, the spokesman for the US-led coalition fighting the group said.
US Army Colonel Ryan Dillon estimates there are around 2,000 IS militants in the northern city, saying they are using civilians and children as human shields.
In one of the largest camps housing those who fled the northern Syrian city, survivors of the group's terror machine explained how they cannot shake off the horrors they witnessed in the group's self-declared capital.
Now in safety at the camp in Ain Issa, a town about 50 kilometers (31 miles) north of Raqqa, they described public killings, hangings, people thrown off roofs and other punishments for the slightest offences.
One girl around 12 years old described how women accused of stealing had their hands immersed in boiling oil.
A 10-year old girl said fighters scolded her for wearing a red T-shirt.
'We were living under unimaginable psychological pressure, God only knows,' said 39-year-old Fatima Mohammed.
'There was a state of terror inside every home.'
Mohammed said one scene set the tone for her for the three years under ISIS rule - a 14-year old who had been accused of theft begging for his life as a militant raised a sharp knife over his head in a public square.
'He kept saying I am innocent,' she said.
The boy tried to fend off the knife with his hands, she said, then the fighter finally shot him twice in the head.
A general view of a refugee camp where Syrian displaced people who fled with their families the battle between U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces and the Islamic State militants from Raqqa and other cities gather, in Ain Issa town, northeast Syria, Wednesday, July 19, 2017
A Syrian displaced boy who fled with his family the battle between US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces and the Islamic State militants from Raqqa city, waits to receive foods at the entrance of the main kitchen of a refugee camp, in Ain Issa town
Smoke rises from a coalition airstrike which attacked an Islamic State position, on the front line on the eastern side of Raqqa where the advances have slowed down
A Syrian displaced boy holds a pot as he bagging a man to give him food at the entrance of the main kitchen of a refugee camp, in Ain Issa town
Halima al-Hamouda, a 32-year-old mother of four from Raqqa city, said her then-12-year-old daughter was harassed by an ISIS nurse who asked her to marry a fighter of the group.
Her son, now 12, was taken to the police station for wearing jeans and he and his father reprimanded.
She herself was flogged for showing her hands, breaking strict Sharia law rules that she cover from head to toe in dark colors.
'It was a man that carried out the 20 lashes,' she recalled.
But it was the story of her neighbors that broke her heart.
She said a boy was thrown off the roof after another neighbor reported him as being gay to the ISIS' morality police.
The boy's father is now working to save money to return to Raqqa to get his vengeance against the neighbor, she said.
'He was a beautiful and wise 13 year-old boy,' she said. |
Nate Diaz and Conor McGregor may have been involved in one of the biggest rivalries in MMA history, but don’t expect the Stockton native to not give credit where it’s due.
Just eight days away from the biggest boxing fight in history, some attention has been drawn to various high profile boxers poking fun at McGregor’s patented warm-ups.
And while McGregor has remained completely unfazed — instead using interviews to point out how poorly the boxers in question were actually doing the work outs) — McGregor’s old MMA foe Diaz has found himself riled up by the continued disrespect boxers have been showing McGregor since before the fight was even announced. Particularly when it comes to the suggestion McGregor could be embarrassed on August 26.
“And now all the boxers are criticising Conor like ‘Conor will get embarrassed’, but that’s a real arrogant thing to say,” Diaz said in an interview with Ariel Helwani earlier this year. “…Wanna know something that’s even more embarrassing? Is if Floyd fought Conor in a MMA match. Would be more embarrassing than if Conor fought Floyd in a boxing match. [Floyd] would get mounted and laughed at, and slapped around [and Conor] would smile at the crowd and wave.”
But what appeared to really get under the younger Diaz brother’s skin is the nature of boxers taking shots at McGregor before he’s even stepped through the ring ropes — especially since none appear ready to get into the Octagon for a much less limited form of combat.
“Boxers are clowns sometimes now,” Diaz said. “I’m never taking the MMA fighters over the boxer’s side when it comes to punching and shit, but I’m like don’t be talking shit. [They say MMA fighter’s] ‘would get embarrassed, it’s ridiculous’ yeah, but we’re talking real fighting now you one-dimensional boxing fucks. This is real life shit, you’ll get embarrassed.”
Correction: An earlier version of this article mistakenly stated this was a recently conducted interview, and attributed it incorrectly.
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Chris Fox, CP24.com
A chiropodist at the Rexdale Community Health Centre is facing 12 charges after he allegedly used a hidden camera to film staff members inside a washroom.
Police were dispatched to the health centre on Taber Road near Kipling Avenue and Rexdale Boulevard on Friday.
Once on scene, officers seized a silver thermos that was located in a staff washroom. Pinhole camera was then located inside that thermos.
Police allege that the suspect was using the camera to film staff members inside the washroom.
Wayne Bassaragh, 48, was arrested on Sunday and charged with 10 counts of voyeurism, one count of mischief and one count of corrupting morals.
Police say that Bassaragh is employed as a chiropodist at the Rexdale Community Health Centre and also works at other clinics with the Greater Toronto Area.
He is scheduled to appear in court at Finch Avenue West on March 31. |
Luton airport has announced plans to boost passenger numbers by nearly seven million a year.
Proposals released by London Luton Airport Limited (LLAL) aim to also create 6,000 jobs.
The airport, the UK's fifth biggest, would handle 18 million passengers a year under the plan, up from 11.5 million.
Its 57% growth bid comes after claims of an air travel capacity shortage in south east England, by 2020.
A four-week public consultation will begin on the 6 February and will include a series of public exhibitions around the region.
'Good neighbour'
The project, known as "futureLuToN:Optimisation", has already been introduced to the airport's consultative committee, which represents local residents, councils and community groups.
In a statement, LLAL said the growth "can be achieved within the airport's existing boundary and using the existing runway" and it will consider what modifications and improvements will be required.
LLAL Chair, Councillor Robin Harris said the airport needed to be ready to "embrace market demand in the future" but it would "listen carefully" before submitting a planning application.
"The benefits that will flow from the airport's development will be realised in the local, regional and national economies," he said.
"We are committed to ensure the airport will continue to be a good neighbour and any growth in passenger numbers is managed in a responsible manner. Impacts on the environment, noise and road traffic flows will be fully evaluated as part of the process."
LLAL has said it intends to submit a planning application for consideration in or around April, at which time a further statutory consultation will be undertaken by Luton Borough Council as planning authority. |
January 16, 2013 at 05:50 Tags Python , Concurrency
A year ago, I wrote a series of posts about using the Python multiprocessing module. One of the posts contrasted compute-intensive task parallelization using threads vs. processes. Today I want to revisit that topic, this time employing the concurrent.futures module which is part of the standard library since Python 3.2
First of all, what are "futures"? The Wikipedia page says:
In computer science, future, promise, and delay refer to constructs used for synchronizing in some concurrent programming languages. They describe an object that acts as a proxy for a result that is initially unknown, usually because the computation of its value is yet incomplete.
I wouldn't say "futures" is the best name choice, but this is what we're stuck with, so let's move on. Futures are actually a very nice tool that helps bridge an annoying gap that always exists in concurrent execution - the gap between launching some computation concurrently and obtaining the result of that computation. As my previous post showed, one of the common ways to deal with this gap is to pass a synchronized Queue object into every worker process (or thread) and then collect the results once the workers are done. Futures make this much easier and more elegant, as we'll see.
For completeness, here is the computation we're going to apply in parallel over a large amount of inputs:
def factorize_naive (n): """ A naive factorization method. Take integer 'n', return list of factors. """ if n < 2 : return [] factors = [] p = 2 while True : if n == 1 : return factors r = n % p if r == 0 : factors.append(p) n = n // p elif p * p >= n: factors.append(n) return factors elif p > 2 : # Advance in steps of 2 over odd numbers p += 2 else : # If p == 2, get to 3 p += 1 assert False , "unreachable"
And here's the first attempt at doing that with concurrent.futures :
from concurrent.futures import ProcessPoolExecutor, as_completed def chunked_worker (nums): """ Factorize a list of numbers, returning a num:factors mapping. """ return {n: factorize_naive(n) for n in nums} def pool_factorizer_chunked (nums, nprocs): # Manually divide the task to chunks of equal length, submitting each # chunk to the pool. chunksize = int (math.ceil( len (nums) / float (nprocs))) futures = [] with ProcessPoolExecutor() as executor: for i in range (nprocs): chunk = nums[(chunksize * i) : (chunksize * (i + 1 ))] futures.append(executor.submit(chunked_worker, chunk)) resultdict = {} for f in as_completed(futures): resultdict.update(f.result()) return resultdict
The end result of pool_factorizer_chunked is a dictionary mapping numbers to lists of their factors. The most interesting thing to note here is this: the function run in a worker process ( chunked_worker in this case) can simply return a value. For each such "call" (submission to the executor), a future is returned. This future encapsulates the result of the execution, which is probably not ready immediately but will be at some point. The concurrent.futures.as_completed helper allows to simply wait on all futures and yield the results of those that are done, whenever they're done.
It's easy to see that this code is conceptually simpler than manually launching the processes, passing some sort of synchronization queues to workers and collecting results. This, IMHO, is the main goal of futures. Futures aren't there to make your code faster, they're there to make it simpler. And any simplification is a blessing when parallel programming is concerned.
Note also that ProcessPoolExecutor is used as a context manager - this makes process cleanup automatic and reliable. For more fine grained control, it has a shutdown method that can be called manually.
There's more. Since the concurrent.futures module allows to simply return a value from a concurrent call, it has another tool to make computations like the above even simpler - Executor.map . Here's the same task rewritten with map :
def pool_factorizer_map (nums, nprocs): # Let the executor divide the work among processes by using 'map'. with ProcessPoolExecutor(max_workers=nprocs) as executor: return {num:factors for num, factors in zip (nums, executor.map(factorize_naive, nums))}
Amazingly, this is it. This small function (a potential 2-liner, if not the wrapping for readability) creates a process pool, submits a bunch of tasks to it, collects all the results when they're ready, puts them into a single dictionary and returns it.
As for performance, the second method is also a bit faster in my benchmarks. I think this makes sense because the manual division to chunks doesn't take into account which chunks will take longer and the division of work between workers may be unbalanced. The map method keeps a pool of workers to which it submits new computations when they're ready, which means that the workers are all kept busy until everything is done. |
Facebook is a great tool to use when advocating for animals. This study found some ways to improve an organization's reach and effectiveness in relation to farm animals.
Social media is an increasingly valuable tool for the animal protection movement to be able to share information with a wide audience without having to rely on traditional, expensive media channels. But as the reach of social media grows, so too does the amount of content we have to compete with to get our message heard. Fortunately, researchers are gathering information to help us understand how we can stand out from the crowd.
Mercy for Animals have published a study titled “How to Dominate Facebook.” In it they look at how social media can be harnessed by animal advocates to leverage their cause on Facebook—which they call “the greatest platform animal advocates have for exposing the cruelty of factory farming and promoting vegan eating.” The researchers analyzed information from more than 1,600 posts generated by Mercy for Animals, Compassion Over Killing, Vegan Outreach, and HSUS’s Farm Animal Protection Department to find out which posts outperformed the rest. The chief metric they used to assess performance was the number of impressions. Though they also see value in assessing a post’s impact, this aspect was not explored in this study.
Based on their findings, MFA has issued nine recommendations for those advocates who campaign about farmed animals issues on Facebook. We have reposted the list here with a few key takeaways:
Post tons and tons of Facebook videos. Then post some more. The research found that videos resulted in 130% more impressions than photos, and photos generated 20% more impressions than links. Make people feel something, especially sadness, anger, amusement, or nausea. The findings showed that posts that conjure up emotions such as these received 80% more impressions than more “neutral” posts. Use fewer than 10 words. The study showed 30% more impressions were generated by using posts of 10 words or less when compared to those with 11-25 words. Ask for shares, not likes or comments. A call to action to share a post increased impressions by 20% when compared to not including this request. Surprisingly, posts encouraging comments or “likes” had even fewer impressions than those without any call to action. Quote often. The researchers found that posts with quotes generated 40 % more impressions than those without. Link to a news article, not a blog, when you want more traffic. News article links generated 60% more impressions than blog post links according to the findings. If it’s about an animal, make it a baby. The study found that posts with very young farmed animals received 20% more impressions than those with adult farmed animals. Farmed animal + companion animal = win. The data suggests that posts pairing a companion animal (such as a dog or a cat) with a farmed animal did well when it came to increasing impressions. Post food and meme photos. Pictures of food resulted in 40% more impressions than photos of animals.
There is no one-size-fits-all approach to successfully increasing awareness of animal issues online. Likewise, there are some important caveats mentioned in the full write-up that are worth taking into consideration when advocating for animals on Facebook. |
There's really no way to sugarcoat it: The rest of world believes that the United States is the country that poses the greatest threat to world peace, beating out all challengers by a wide margin.
This is the conclusion of a massive world opinion poll conducted by Win/Gallup International and released at the close of 2013. The poll, which was first conducted in 1977, asked over 66,000 thousand people across 65 countries this year a variety of questions about the world, including which country they would most like to call home, whether or not the world is becoming a generally better place and which country poses the greatest threat to world peace.
The U.S. was voted the biggest threat by far, garnering 24 percent of the vote. Pakistan was a very distant second with 8 percent, followed by China (6 percent) and Afghanistan (5 percent).
Perhaps not surprisingly, Americans had a slightly different view of the international troublemakers, naming Iran the top threat. Yet while Afghanistan garnered the second-most votes among American respondents, they also voted the U.S. among the most threatening nations -- in an unenviable veritable tie for third place with North Korea.
Interestingly, the U.S. was also the country to which people around the world would most like to move, if given the opportunity. Also, close to 50 percent of respondents expressed optimism about the future, reporting that they are more positive about 2014 than they were for 2013.
“Despite an unstable economic situation, our happiness index is extremely high all over the world except in Europe," Jean-Marc Leger, President of WIN/Gallup International Association, said in a statement. "Moreover people think that 2014 will be better than 2013. Optimism is back in the world.” |
BlizzCon 2015 may be over, but there’s still a ton of information to process, particularly in regards to the next World of Warcraft expansion, Legion. While at the convention, we had a chance to sit down and talk with Lead Narrative Designer Dave Kosak about the upcoming Class Halls, pre-launch event details, zone-wide scaling, dungeons, and plenty more from Legion. We even managed to find out a little more about the whereabouts of everybody’s favorite dragon prince while we were at it.
Blizzard Watch: We’re pretty much obligated to ask this — flying in Legion, any word on how that’s going to work?
Dave Kosak: That’s a good question — so flying will be available in a patch, and you’ll unlock it, and we’ll try and make sure it’s an interesting experience to unlock flying.
Is it going to be similar to what we did in Warlords?
Similar but maybe a little meatier and a little less grindy I think, I hope — we haven’t finished designing it yet.
Is this something that’s going to come in one of the earlier patches or the last patch?
I don’t think we’ve made that decision yet. The flying thing, I think – we didn’t do flying justice in Draenor.
Is the 40 player scenario discussed during the overview panel part of the pre-launch event content we’ll see before Legion is released? Can you tell us more about what we’ll see there?
Yes, right, it’ll be pre-launch. So we have one of our most ambitious pre-launch events that we’ve ever done.
Tell us about that!
So we thought — the Burning Legion is coming back to Azeroth, right? And to be honest, in World of Warcraft, we’ve never seen the Burning Legion at its full might. Like even in Outland, the planet was already shattered — it was the dregs, it was the left behind forces. So what does that look like? Well, they’re coming, right — so in this pre-patch event, they’re going to invade places all over Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms. And we have — and I think we showed some screenshots of it in the overview panel — we’ve got these enormous Legion citadels, these gigantic flying buildings that just land and like implant themselves on the ground.
Kind of like the Scourge invasion?
Similar, yeah! And we have some new tech that allows us to have buildings that just embed themselves in the ground, and demons will just pour out of this, and the whole zone’s going to have to come together, there’ll be some quests to do to cleanse that zone. And this invasion will be happening for the weeks leading up to the expansion, so big, big stuff is going down! You’re going to get to see the Legion in full force, and I hope you saw all the new demon models yesterday — it’s…the Legion is coming! (laughs)
The world event stuff that’s happening — it’s landing across every zone?
Not every zone, there’s key points along Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms.
Is this one of those instances where these things are going to scale to whatever level of the person that attacks it, or is it going to be like older events where lower level zones = lower level mobs?
I believe this is all max level — it might be scary on your bank alt! (laughs)
You mentioned dungeons would be a viable alternative to raiding as far as endgame content is concerned. Will there be tier sets or something similar to the gear you find in raids available in dungeon content?
Not distinct sets, what we can do is we can scale the level of the loot you get so that as you do — and this is one of the features I’m most excited about–
The challenge thing?
Yeah! As you ramp up the difficulty of the dungeons, we can gradually ramp up the quality of the gear you get.
It sounds like the only limit is how much content you can complete.
Yeah — how tough are you? And like Ion said at the panel yesterday, eventually these dungeons will break you, but how far can you get? And if you really like that type of gameplay, if you’re not really a raider but you like doing dungeons, and small group content like that, this is a way to keep playing and a way to keep those relevant in a way that hasn’t.
It also lets us do something else which is in the past, because our loot was so strictly tiered, if we wanted to have a couple more dungeons in a patch, we really couldn’t do it. We had to add another tier of gear and then everybody would just do those two or three dungeons instead of the other dungeons that were in there — and that actually made dungeons less relevant in some ways. But this means that we can throw in more dungeons and they can scale like all the other dungeons.
So it’s scaling around you?
Exactly! And you kind of can pick your challenge; you can do things around the world to get that dungeon keystone that has your dungeon traits like we talked about at the overview panel.
The dungeon keystone — is that a consumable item?
It’s consumable, but I think you have to beat the dungeon to consume it, so you can use it to get the loot. We’re still tinkering with that system, right, so it’s something we’re still building, so I don’t know all the exact details like where you get it or when do you consume it, but yeah.
I love the idea of entire world zones that scale to your level, allowing you to choose your own path. Is this something you think might be feasible to add to the leveling experience from level 1 on up?
That would be super cool, but we didn’t — when we put all those monsters in and even when we redid it with Cataclysm we kept some of those old monsters in, and they don’t have all the hooks to scale their abilities correctly. So it would be an effort — we think that would be cool, but it’s not something we’re planning right now.
Would you say it’s on the same level as the Cataclysm revamp of the old world zones?
Yeah! There might be programmatic ways that we could make it easier than the — look, Cataclysm was a lot of by hand going in there and re-doing a lot of stuff. (laughs)
Do you still think the Tanaan Jungle/Timeless Isle style of content delivery is working and keeping players engaged? Will we see more of that style of content in Legion?
There are things that we like about it. We definitely like that there’s something to do every day and that you can kind of pick your own path. Some feedback that we got and that we agree with was that things like in patch 5.1 when you had some story content interlaced with that, made it feel much much cooler. And I think that’s good feedback. And we didn’t have enough of that say, in you know, some of our more recent patches.
So we’re looking at that, giving you a real sense of progression with the factions that you’re working with and their stories, as well as just that sort of open world is a toy thing. Since all the zones scale, it means that we don’t have the problem that we had in say, Pandaria where we had to carve out a little chunk of the zone for the max level area, but it was separate from the main area — we don’t have to worry about that now because all the zones will scale to you.
It sounds sort of like an open world scenario in a way — like when you did the scenarios in Pandaria and phased into a particular area of the world.
It should feel like the whole world is a playground, and that’s what we’re really going for. And you’ll be able to see the rewards and pick and choose your path and say like “Oh, what do I want to do today? Well that looks interesting up here and maybe go over there.”
A lot of people were comparing what we saw at the overview panel as far as endgame material with the bounty system in Diablo, it seemed like it was kind of the same concept?
It’s similar; because we’ve been looking at Diablo, and if your readers haven’t played Diablo 3 recently, it’s so good right now, it’s so good, they’re doing a great job at kind of just keeping their content evergreen, it’s just always fun. So we’re looking at that and I wouldn’t say — it’s something we’re inspired by, but I don’t think it will feel exactly the same. It’ll feel very WoW, a WoW version of that.
A lot of people are missing scenarios — small scale content that didn’t require a big group or the usual tank/healer/dps combination. Are we going to see something similar make a return in Legion, or something to help with DPS queues for dungeons?
Well we hope that niche is kind of filled by the open world content.
Is that solo stuff or group stuff or both?
It’s all of it, so instead of queueing for something, you see something cool happening in the world and you go there, and if there are other people you can group with them, or just work with them together and take care of the problem, whatever it is.
So those little events that pop up around the world — I’m assuming some of them are PVP, some world bosses — are some of them quest hubs?
It goes back to what I said — feeling like you are unlocking story with these factions that you’re working with and getting some story content there. It’s something we’re still developing, still working on — that endgame is something that we’ve been prioritizing this expansion so we’ve been working on it all along, but it’s not all dialed in yet. And we do want to get that feeling of progression, that feeling that you’ve got some story here as well.
Yesterday, class halls were described as something not quite like a garrison — that banks and the auction house would still be in Dalaran. What kind of content can players expect to find in class halls to keep them engaged and coming back?
So class halls — a couple of big features, one is you have your mission map where you can send out your followers.
Mission map — like a garrison mission table?
Yeah, you’ve got a mission table again, and we’re still tinkering with that system because we want the followers to be a little more meaty, to have a little more substance to them, and to be something where you can adventure with your followers, and they all have stories.
Like you take them on quests?
Well they need stuff done, and you can go with them, they’ll be a questline to unlock. Now we’re still working on that system, but we want the followers to be more meaningful. So you’ve got a mission table, you’ve got your followers there. Faction representatives will show up in your mission hall, and they’ll have some of those quests we talked about. And also that’s sort of your hub where you can tinker with your artifact — so you’ll have some sort of, it’s thematic based on your class, but like if you’re a paladin, there’s a giant shrine, a big altar where you can tinker with your artifact and that’s where you change your artifact abilities.
Is it like the runeforge that Death Knights have?
A lot like the runeforge, in fact Death Knights are using Acherus as an order hall, we’re uprising it a little bit, we’re kind of tinkering with it to bring it up to date.
Well they’ve probably cleaned it up a little bit by now!
Yeah! Still a lot of skulls though, still a lot of skulls! But yeah, you go there, just as they would tinker with their runeblade, you can tinker with your artifact and tweak it. So you have your missions and your artifact, and some of the order halls have little perks and little bonuses, I think we talked at the Q&A how where if you go to the warrior order hall, there’s a little arena there where you can do a little dueling with other warriors because that was thematic.
Do the others have something? Can you give us a couple more?
Let’s see — not all these are in yet. The rogues, we had a little pickpocket mini-game that we were playing with and having some fun with. I don’t think any of the others are ready to go yet. And the goal was — like Craig (Amai) said yesterday at the Q&A, the goal is not to have everybody has something equally cool, some of them will have something special, some of them might not.
Do you worry about feedback on that though, where a class might feel like “Well we didn’t get a special thing, so we’re not as special?”
Well it’s not special if everyone gets it! So it’s one of those things where when it’s thematically awesome, like rogues pickpocketing each other, then yeah, we go for it. But we don’t want to shoehorn stuff in that’s not thematically awesome just because “Oh they need their special thing.” It’s important to us when we say our value is concentrate the coolness. So yeah order halls, unlike the garrison — I mean one point of feedback we got with the garrisons is that yeah, you’re in an MMO, but your garrison is basically you and a bunch of NPCs, and so it kind of felt lonely, and that was — that’s very important in an MMO, so your order hall having others of your class around should be kind of cool, kind of like a clubhouse for your class.
So the class halls aren’t phased to just you?
Exactly! And it’ll be kind of like a rogue clubhouse and everyone can be talking about what they’re doing with their rogue artifacts and stuff.
Is it still going to be in the sewers? People are asking about that one.
So when we first said it was in the sewers I think people assumed it was just going to be in an existing room down there. And we’ve actually carved out a really, really cool space for rogues, like this little hidden secret enclave underneath Dalaran.
Like a speakeasy where you have to give the password at the door?
Totally! (laughs) That’s the kind of feel we wanted to get is like — you know about this place, you whisper to the doorman and you get in there and there’s a whole little clubhouse of seedy rogue characters that are all pulling the strings right from within the heart of Dalaran. So yeah, I think the rogue order hall, class hall is very, very cool.
The Emerald Dream and Emerald Nightmare have both been something that players have been clamoring to see more of. Is the dungeon and raid the most we’re going to see out of the Emerald Dream — is this the official end of the Emerald Nightmare story?
It’s almost certainly not the last time we’re going to see the Emerald Dream because it’s such a core part of the druid fantasy. It’s a core part of the druid fantasy, the Emerald Dream, so I don‘t think that this is the last chapter of that. But it is the first time we’ve depicted the Nightmare in game, and our artists — I hope you saw it at the panel — our artists have just done this phenomenal job of creating this, it’s kind of this primal Azeroth, but it’s also just a nightmare vision of what could happen in Azeroth. And you saw the Xavius model, you know, Xavius as he pictures himself. And the Nightmare is just this ferocious, terrible thing. So yeah that’ll be thematically, that’ll be very, very cool.
Players tend to jump on customization in games — more and more new titles are offering ways for players to customize their experience, whether it be through appearance sliders, armor dyes or armor crafting like in Diablo 3, or even the ability for players to create custom small-scale content. Is this the kind of thing we’ll ever see in WoW?
Well in interviews you never want to say never, but there are certainly no plans for like, user created content, we have no plans for that — that would be very, very…I wouldn’t say difficult, but there are a lot of issues involved in getting player content into the game. We certainly — there’s no plans to release our toolset or allow people to create content because our toolset is so integrated into our system, we couldn’t — there’s really no way we could even release it. That would be an enormous undertaking and I don’t see that in the near future for WoW for sure.
Now as for customization of armor, we think that there is something we can do, sort of the next step of transmogrification, what you asked about before, the idea of you unlocking item or weapon appearances and you can swap them in and out. There’s also a lot of customization for your artifact by the way, which is fun. The artists have gone hog wild on the artifacts, they’re — every one is completely epic, and then you have a lot of choices for how it’ll appear, both from color scheme and the model you use. And all those are unlocked, so that’s just more content, more to do.
With the artifact weapon — obviously there’s a quest involved in getting that artifact. Is that something that happens during the pre-launch event, or post launch?
It won’t be in the pre-launch, but when Legion launches, when the game launches it’s one of the first things you do, as you embark on your journey.
What would you say were the biggest lessons you took from Warlords of Draenor?
That is a really good question — because the thing is, with every patch we’re learning something, and often we experiment with ideas in patches. Sometimes at Blizzard we’re guilty of ‘that idea sort of didn’t work, so we’ll do the exact opposite in the next patch’ and we’ll throw everything out with that. But if you look at our progression, certainly in the last couple of expansions, you can see that we have constantly been tinkering with the endgame to try and find that right formula where it can feel open ended, but still give you some direction, some story direction. We’re still trying to dial that in, because I don’t think we hit that sweet spot yet. We didn’t hit it with Pandaria, but we had a lot of cool story. We didn’t quite hit it with Warlords, but we had a lot of cool content. And I think we can — somewhere, somewhere in there is the sweet spot, we want to find that sweet spot.
And that’s across the board — one thing we’ve been learning is just how important it is to keep players together and let them play the kind of content that they want. When we introduced flex into raiding, that was a huge improvement to raiding, that was monumental I would say. Because you no longer had to make these ugly decisions of ‘Oh there’s 11 players, well one of you has got to sit out’ you know, and you don’t have to do that decision anymore. If you want to raid, there’s a spot for you, right?
And now we’re looking at extending that across the board — like well what if you like dungeons, well we want to make sure you always can play dungeons, you can play dungeons with your friends, and you’re rewarded for playing dungeons, and that’s why we’re really added that sort of scaling dungeon technology in there, so that you always have something you can play if you like that kind of content. Same with — and again, back to the outdoor world, if you like just venturing out in the world and doing stuff, we want to make sure you have rewarding content that you can do.
The scaling you’re talking about for raids — you’re talking about buddy number 11 that you have to leave behind — what if you have buddy number six for a dungeon? Is there a possibility of scaling dungeons to take more players along than the usual five?
We have thought about that, not for dungeons yet — dungeons are very very tuned to have that one tank, one healer, three DPS, and tuned around that. But those ideas, those ideas of we never want you to leave a friend behind is something that we’re always looking at in the game.
Timewalking — people love timewalking in dungeons. Any plans to expand that beyond dungeons and maybe add some Timewalking raids?
That’s a good Ion question — we don’t have any immediate plans for that. But I mean, it feels like we have the technology that we could make that happen, we’d need to put some work into it to make sure those scale properly. There’s so much great content, like Karazhan’s great, right? And often we’re just taking player feedback and so we’re looking at how many people are doing Timewalking and how popular that is and that helps us decide oh, that feature’s worth doing, there’s a lot of interest in it.
Mists of Pandaria had a year long stretch of Siege of Orgrimmar before Warlords of Draenor. It feels like we’re looking at something similar with the end of Warlords of Draenor. Is this the new normal?
We’ve stated that we really want to release content faster, and we’ve been growing the team, the World of Warcraft team is the largest it’s ever been. But we also, you know, Blizzard has this value that we absolutely cannot release something if we don’t think it’s the highest quality. And so these values constantly bump up against each other – our team is bigger than ever, and we’ve been really good at making stuff more awesome, but not necessarily coming out with it faster (laughs) I mean you saw all of it at the panel, those dungeons, the dungeon screenshots? The dungeons — there’s 10 of them, they’re all amazing looking, they’re so gorgeous!
We’ve been working on this expansion since even in the middle of development of Draenor, we started work on this expansion. And we keep making it cool, but we’re not doing very good with it yet on coming out faster — but it is our goal going forward, we really do feel like a faster pace of content release is better for the game and better for fans, and we can do better jobs. So we’re working on that, that’s our goal, we’ve been really focused on it. With Mists we did a great job with coming out with content faster, but we weren’t on the ball with getting the next expansion ready. And honestly had we just stretched out the content, I think some of those raids, people weren’t finished with them, they weren’t done with them before the next tier of content came out, so we could’ve stretched that out better.
Last question! Wrathion – are we going to see him in Legion?
(laughs) So Wrathion had a couple cameos in Draenor, we gave him a rest, but he’s definitely in Legion, and he’s got an agenda. And also — this has been the battle that since he was born — and his mission in life has been, he knows the Legion is coming, and this is his nightmare come true, so he’s definitely a factor.
Is he going to keep buddying up with Anduin? They had some great banter in Mists.
I love that relationship with Anduin! I can’t say anything there, but I will tell you that we’re going to get some Wrathion — Wrathion’s back, this is his fight.
Thanks so much for taking the time to chat with us Dave — we look forward to seeing what Legion has in store! |
A Ukrainian lawmaker said Monday he was glad to learn that former Donald Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort had been indicted in the U.S. on charges largely stemming from his work as a consultant to a former Ukrainian president accused of bilking the country of billions of dollars.
Sergei Leshchenko, an Ukrainian lawmaker who spearheaded an investigation into allegations that Manafort received as much as $12.7 million in secret cash payments from a pro-Russia political party in Ukraine, said the indictment showed that the “bad guys will be punished.”
“I’m very happy,” Leshchenko said by phone from Kiev on Monday evening. “A corrupt American spin doctor helped [former Ukrainian President Viktor] Yanukovych win elections and push Ukraine toward a pro-Russia agenda. He was paid by corrupt people who stole Ukrainian taxpayers’ money.”
Manafort was indicted on several charges of money laundering and tax evasion. He pleaded not guilty to the charges. The charges are linked to Manafort’s work during 10 years for a Russia-leaning political party in Ukraine called the Party of Regions.
That party supported Yanukovych, who was ousted in February 2014 during mass street protests known as the Maidan revolution. Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets of the Ukrainian capital of Kiev to protest Yanukovych’s reversal on a promise to sign a trade and association agreement with the European Union. The street protests were followed by the Russian annexation of Crimea, and a military conflict in the east with Kremlin-backed separatist militias.
“I feel like I didn’t waste my time on this, even though there was a lot of skeptics when I first started," Leshchenko said. "People said it wasn’t a good way to begin relations with the new administration. But it’s important to show that the bad guys will be punished.” |
Or, When Did We Start Living in a Fictional Satire?
I’ve compared recent events—and, in particular, this presidential election—to many things: Armageddon, Alien, every Batman story, and almost every ’90s action movie.
But there is one painful metaphor that I have not explored: the 2016 election appears to have been written by writer and satirist Kurt Vonnegut.
I first started pondering the question of did Vonnegut write our current political climate this spring, when my aunt (a librarian) pointed out to me how much Donald Trump resembles a Vonnegut character.
I soon googled trump vonnegut and was surprised not to see more about it. I found a handful of articles, but none that fully explored the extent to which the candidate Donald Trump seems to have sprung straight from a Vonnegut novel. Nor did anyone mention the extent to which this entire election resembles a Vonnegut-penned narrative and universe.
Listen:
America has become a Kurt Vonnegut novel.
Donald Trump is the quintessential wealthy Vonnegut anti-hero.
Beginning with his second novel, The Sirens of Titan—and continuing throughout the majority of his novels and short stories—Vonnegut loved to portray the impassioned, confused, wealthy white American male.
There is a multi-millionaire or billionaire in almost every Vonnegut novel: some are romantic alcoholics with inherited wealth, some are self-made Midwestern car dealers, all are troubled and confused.
Trump is the paragon of the Vonnegutian anti-hero. He is one of the few people who both inherited his wealth and pulled himself up by his own gaudy bootstraps. Consider the public figure Trump, and then consider this description of Malachi Constant of Sirens of Titan:
Everything Constant did he did in style – aggressively, loudly, childishly, wastefully – making himself and mankind look bad. Constant bristled with courage – but it was anything but un-neurotic Every courageous thing he had ever done had been motivated by spitefulness and by goads from childhood that made fear seem puny indeed.
There are others, of course, who Trump resembles:
Eliot Rosewater is a recurring Vonnegut character who, unlike Trump, is a socialist and a heavy drinker but who, like Trump, is a tuxedo-wearing populist propelled forward by quixotic passions.
Slapstick‘s Dr. Wilbur Daffodil-11 Swain is a lonely disfigured man living alone in a skyscraper as the world ends around him. He’s also the President of the United States.
Andrew Macintosh in Galapagos is a self-styled adventurer and heir to a great fortune.
Papa Monzano of Cat’s Cradle is less Trump and more the kind of man Trump would want to pal around with: an aging dictator of a third world country who ultimately destroys the world.
Dwayne Hoover of Breakfast of Champions and Deadeye Dick is a self-made wealthy man whose wealth, privilege, and ambitions prevent anyone from realizing he is slowly slipping into madness.
No Vonnegut novel feels complete without this character. In the few that omit a brash, adventuring, privileged anti-hero, one wonders why Vonnegut is going so far off his own script.
In today’s America, our central character is the attention-seeking, self-congratulatory, ambitious and dangerous Donald Trump. He wants his White House, just like the Vonnegut characters who desire their wars, their planets, and their power.
But Trump is not the only way in which this election resembles a Vonnegut narrative.
Hillary Clinton is an expansion of one of Vonnegut’s female characters, representing a plotline he never fully explored.
One could never accurately accuse Vonnegut of sexism or misogyny. His female characters, like his male characters, tend to be mixed-up humans just trying to find their place in the world.
What better Vonnegut plot than a novel in which the man and woman are former friends and rivals for the same position? Perhaps one attended the wedding of the other? Perhaps both have troubled marriages that the entire country has watched through their ups and downs?
Perhaps they are both manifestations of this excerpt from Vonnegut’s book of essays, God Bless You, Dr Kevorkian:
I know what women want. They want a whole lot of people to talk to. What do they want to talk about? They want to talk about everything. What do men want? They want a lot of pals, and they wish people wouldn’t get so mad at them.
What better platform for a woman to talk to everyone about everything than running for the presidency?
What better platform for a man to have lots of pals and wish people weren’t mad at him than a presidential bid?
But the extent to which Vonnegut could have written Clinton does not stop there. Let’s consider how disliked she is: as of August, she hit a record for the amount of Americans who have a negative opinion of her.
The dislike for Hillary Clinton often seems to stem from two things: she does everything we expect out of a politician, but nothing we expect out of a woman. She’s certainly not a woman that Vonnegut ever wrote about, as most of his female characters existed within the roles expected for them (even when that role was to become a school teacher on Mars or live in an exhibit for time-transcending beings.)
Vonnegut would regularly amuse his audiences by describing American society from a detached, ethnographic-esque perspective. Here’s his description of a minor character in Breakfast of Champions:
Patty Keene was stupid on purpose, which was the case with most women in Midland City. The women had big minds because they were big animals, but they did not use them much for this reason: unusual ideas could make enemies, and the women, if they were going to achieve any sort of comfort and safety, needed all the friends they could get. So, in the interests of survival, they trained themselves to be agreeing machines instead of thinking machines. All their minds had to do was to discover what other people were thinking, and then they thought that, too.
What we get with Hillary Clinton is a female character who both breaks this mold, but doesn’t. She’s making enemies and has left comfort and safety long ago, but she’s managing to do it while attempting to continue the efforts and policies of the Democratic Party. She is proving, perhaps, that a woman doesn’t need any unusual ideas to be hated by half the country.
She has nothing in common with Patty Keene – or most of Vonnegut’s other women characters, who frequently kill themselves if they do find any escape. Vonnegut’s women choose safety or suicide, while Hillary Clinton has chosen a very different path. But all the same, she seems to have sprung from the pages of satire.
But if this is a Vonnegut novel, isn’t there still a central character missing?
Bernie Sanders is our befuddled, aging Kilgore Trout
There has perhaps never been a more lovable character than Vonnegut’s Kilgore Trout. He is cranky, lonely, frustrated, unsuccessful, and thoroughly entertaining.
Initially inspired by Vonnegut’s friend Theodore Sturgeon, Trout increasingly became a surrogate for Vonnegut in his own writing. As his career progressed, Vonnegut would retcon Trout’s life and biography, always expanding and revising the world of Kilgore Trout while regularly providing his readers with summaries of unwritten sci-fi stories by Trout.
Like Sanders, Trout is several things:
A controversial figure with some very fervent fans
A socialist
A brave man
A man known for his determination and optimism
Of course, in some ways, Sanders is more Vonnegut than he is Trout. Vonnegut has legions of devoted fans, just like Sanders, while Kilgore Trout had very few fans in most of his narratives.
Vonnegut, like Sanders, was a frequent defender of socialism. One example can be found in his book of essays A Man Without a Country:
“Socialism” is no more an evil word than “Christianity.” Socialism no more prescribed Joseph Stalin and his secret police and shuttered churches than Christianity prescribed the Spanish Inquisition. Christianity and socialism alike, in fact, prescribe a society dedicated to the proposition that all men, women, and children are created equal and shall not starve.”
And so we have, in this narrative, our two central characters of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, as our narrator Bernie Sanders looks on, increasingly dismayed and distraught.
But are there any other characters worth mentioning? Of course there is: all the inanimate ones.
A sum of money…
It’s hard to choose the best Vonnegut novel, but God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater is certainly up there. This 1965 novel displays its humor and perspective from its opening sentence:
A sum of money is a leading character in this tale about people, just as a sum of honey might properly be a leading character in a tale about bees.
Vonnegut’s novels frequently had non-humans in central roles: computers, spaceships, planets, buildings, and sums of money.
Likewise, in this election, we have some recurring characters who are certainly not human:
A theoretical wall to be built on the border between two countries
A mysterious email server that draws endless speculation and investigation
Steaks, cell phones, pantsuits, speeches, golf courses, skyscrapers and, of course, lots and lots of money.
And then, of course: all the entertaining and detailed subplots
What is a great book without all the details, the subplots, the stories that tie in?
In the America of 2016, there is hardly a moment that doesn’t become something for the candidates to discuss. Comments over a woman’s weight, conspiracy theories about birth certificates and JFK’s assassination, reminders of the painful pasts of both major candidates.
But which subplot has become more enduring than that of the National Anthem?
And could we have chosen one that would have pleased Vonnegut more?
Beginning in the National Football League’s preseason and continuing until today, professional athlete Colin Kaepernick has chosen to sit during the Star Spangled Banner.
Why would this so please Vonnegut? Consider these words from the first chapter of Breakfast of Champions:
Trout and Hoover were citizens of the United States of America, a country which was called America for short. This was their national anthem, which was pure balderdash, like so much they were expected to take seriously.
He goes on to print the anthem in its entirety, before saying:
There were one quadrillion nations in the Universe, but the nation Dwayne Hoover and Kilgore Trout belonged to was the only one with a national anthem that was gibberish sprinkled with question marks.
But he does not leave it at that.
…the anthem and the vacant motto might not have mattered much, if it weren’t for this: a lot of citizens were so ignored and cheated and insulted that they thought they might make be in the wrong country, or even on the wrong planet, that some terrible mistake had been made. It might have comforted the some if their anthem and their motto had mentioned fairness or brotherhood or hope or happiness, had somehow welcomed them to the society and its real estate.
Consider this depiction of lost Americans, then consider the rhetoric of not just Colin Kaepernick but of Clinton and Trump. Consider Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” and his economic populism. Consider Hillary Clinton’s quote:”Americans have fought their way back from tough economic times, but the deck is still stacked in favor of those at the top.”
What is happening here? Are all of our public figures reading Vonnegut?
A world beyond satire?
There are those who bemoan this election, and Trump in particular, for one surprising characteristic: they are “beyond satire.” As The Economist puts it:
… their extravagant tastelessness and shared macho posturings—Mr Putin’s on horseback, Mr Trump’s at the podium—both also, alas, leave very little room for satire.
When the world becomes satire, how does one satirize it? South Park, soon to be on their fourth president, has solved this by never directly mentioning Trump, using Mr. Garrison as his surrogate. Staples like The Onion and The Daily Show have found themselves simply depicting reality, rather than satirizing it.
The hardest part about finding humor in this election is that the election itself is an absurdity. You have a woman who used to live in the White House trying to live in the White House again, running against a troubled man who insults half the world in his efforts to live in the White House too.
Meanwhile, America watches this man and this woman yell at one another, and about one another, and is told to choose sides. For many Americans, there is no discernible protagonist. For others, we can’t imagine how someone could support that candidate.
But if this is a Vonnegut novel, then how does it end?
And so that is the question: how does it end? Is it a tragedy or a comedy? Will Donald Trump, like Malachi Constant and Eliot Rosewater before him, have some kind of epiphany, becoming a good-hearted and generous benefactor who apologies for his previous faults? Will Bernie Sanders get abducted by aliens? Will we all become unstuck in time? Or have we already?
Where should we look for our answers?
Perhaps I shouldn’t be making these comparisons at all. Perhaps the reason things have become so troubled is because we confuse our lives for fictions. Consider when Vonnegut says in Breakfast of Champions that the trouble with storytellers is their “tendency to make people believe that life [has] leading characters, minor characters, insignificant details, that is [has] lessons to be learned, tests to be passed, and a beginning, a middle, and an end.”
As he tells us in Breakfast of Champions,
…I had become more and more enraged and mystified by the idiot decisions made by my countrymen. And then I had come suddenly to pity them, for I understood how innocent and natural it was for them to behave so abominably, and with such abominable results: They were doing their best to live like people invented in story books. This was the reason Americans shot each other so often: It was a convenient literary device for ending short stories and books. Why were so many Americans treated by their government as though their lives were as disposable as paper facial tissues? Because that was the way authors customarily treated bit-part players in their made-up tales. And so on. Once I understood what was making America such a dangerous, unhappy nation of people who had nothing to do with real life, I resolved to shun storytelling. I would write about life. Every person would be exactly as important as any other. All facts would also be given equal weightiness. Nothing would be left out. Let others bring order to chaos. I would bring chaos to order, instead, which I think I have done. If all writers would do that, then perhaps citizens not in the literary trades will understand that there is no order in the world around us, that we must adapt ourselves to the requirements of chaos instead. It is hard to adapt to chaos, but it can be done. I am living proof of that: It can be done.
And let us remember one more Vonnegut philosophy. A philosophy that is particularly difficult at the moment, from what must be his saddest novel.
Something from the first chapter of Slaughterhouse-Five, in which Vonnegut employs the first person and tells us about his actual life, including his time spent as a prisoner of war of the Germans in World War II:
I think about my education sometimes. I went to the University of Chicago for awhile after the Second World War. I was a student in the Department of Anthropology. At that time they were teaching that there was absolutely no difference between anybody. They may be teaching that still. Another thing they taught was that no one was ridiculous or bad or disgusting. Shortly before my father died, he said to me, ‘You know – you never wrote a story with a villain in it.’ I told him that was one of the things I learned in college after the war.
What are we to do with this? Could there be a less appealing notion to an American today than the suggestion that this world contains no villains? What are we to do with the options in front of us without resorting to demonizing the enemy?
Or is Vonnegut wrong about this one? Does it even matter what he would say?
Perhaps there is no right answer. But when the world is full of questions, it’s important to continue asking questions and to do everything we can to learn the answers.
One more Vonnegut quote:
So it goes.
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Vincent Thian / AP The third session of the 13th Beijing People's Congress
For the past 40 years, Americans have looked at Asia's phenomenal economic growth and asked, What are they doing right, and what are we doing wrong? Today the question rings louder than ever. As Asia surges out of the Great Recession, experts are searching furiously for the secrets of the region's resilience, those nuggets of Eastern wisdom that could rejuvenate a tired and confused U.S. economy.
Don't get your hopes up. Asia can surely provide lessons for the West, but Americans often take the wrong lessons from Asia's growth stories and we seem to be doing it again now. (See pictures of the global financial crisis.)
That's because many people mistakenly believe that Asia offers a superior political-economic model for meeting the modern world's economic challenges. That perception, however, is based on the incorrect notion that Asia's success is the product of intrusive governments. In the 1980s, when Japan was Asia's rising giant, some said its state-led economic system, in which bureaucrats "picked winners" by targeting industries for special support, was better than the more laissez-faire practices of the West. Today, pundits see China's "state capitalism" as the contender for global dominance. The heavier hand of the Chinese government, this thinking goes, acts as a source of strength in hard times while firmly guiding the nation into the industries of the future. China's vibrancy has even led Americans to question the viability of the very tenets of democracy. "It is intellectually and politically unsettling to realize that, if the West cannot quickly straighten out its systems of government, only politically unreformed states like China will be able to make the decisions that a nation needs to survive in today's high-speed, hi-tech, increasingly globalized world," scholar Orville Schell recently wrote. (See TIME's coverage of the 2010 World Economic Forum in Davos.)
Sure, the authoritarian rulers in Beijing can sometimes implement policies more efficiently than the argumentative democrats of the West. That's exactly why Beijing's recession-busting stimulus plan proved more effective than Washington's. With no political debate to get in the way, China's bureaucrats splashed money everywhere to toss up shiny new infrastructure. The slumping economy needs more credit? Well, that's easy if you own the banks. Just open a spigot and watch the money flow. China's government can also push ahead on important long-term projects with greater speed. While health care reform in the U.S. languishes in Congress, China is building an extensive health care system to cover nearly all of its 1.3 billion people. (See TIME's China covers.)
But there are few things more annoying than pundits in the democratic U.S., who are firmly protected by the Bill of Rights, waxing poetic about the virtues of dictatorships. What they're forgetting is the frightening downside to China's authoritarian state capitalism, and not just in terms of human rights. China's stimulus program might have produced growth, but it could very well have undermined the health of the banking system. The Chinese economy is riddled with excess capacity, inefficient state enterprises and asset bubbles.
More important, the idea that the state made China rich is simply not true. China only started growing when the overbearing government got out of the way and allowed private enterprise, both Chinese and foreign, to thrive. The same is true in India. Across Asia, in fact, the primary engine of growth has always been the market, not the state. All rapid-growth Asian economies including China's succeeded by latching onto the expanding forces of globalization, through free trade and free flows of capital. South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore may have had active bureaucrats, but the true source of their economic growth was exports manufactured by private companies and sold to the consumers of the world. Asia's growth story is more a testament to the dangers of state meddling than its virtues. Just look at Japan, which has been suffering for 20 years from the damage caused by too much bureaucratic interference.
See pictures of the global financial crisis. |
Conflicting reports on whether blast caused by bomb or gas cylinder used to power vehicle
Eighteen people were killed when an explosion ripped through a minibus travelling in a militant area of north-west Pakistan today, police said.
There were conflicting reports on whether the blast had been caused by a bomb or by a gas cylinder used to power the bus, which was travelling between the cities of Hangu and Kohat, close to Pakistan's lawless tribal region.
The explosion tore apart the vehicle, killing all 17 people on board, and tipped over a second bus nearby, the Hangu police chief, Abdur Rasheed, said. One person on the other bus was killed and 11 others wounded, he said.
Rasheed said the blast happened when the gas cylinder on board malfunctioned, but the leading police official in the region claimed explosives had been used to trigger the blast.
Islamist militants frequently carry out attacks against both civilians and security forces in the area.
Local television footage showed the twisted frame of the first bus lying beside the road, with little left except its wheels and undercarriage. The second bus was on its side, with its windows blown out and blood stains visible on the outside. |
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: President Obama is expected today to nominate John Brennan as the next director of the Central Intelligence Agency and former Republican Senator Chuck Hagel as defense secretary. We begin by looking at John Brennan, 25-year CIA veteran who currently serves as Obama’s top counterterrorism adviser. Brennan has played a key role in the expansion of Obama’s secret drone war and has been dubbed by some to be the, quote, “assassination czar.” Brennan was a rumored pick for the job when Obama was first elected in 2008 but was forced to withdraw from consideration amidst protests over his role at the CIA under George W. Bush. Brennan had publicly supported the CIA’s policies of so-called “enhanced interrogation techniques” and extraordinary rendition.
Joining us now by Democracy Now! videostream is Marcy Wheeler, an investigative blogger who has written extensively about John Brennan. She runs the website EmptyWheel.net. She joins us from Michigan.
Marcy, welcome to Democracy Now! Tell us who John Brennan is.
MARCY WHEELER: So, if Barack Obama had the equivalent of a Dick Cheney, so somebody who is involved in all of the national security decisions, is the last person to speak to Obama before he makes these decisions, if we trust him, if we believe he actually asks Obama these decisions, the one who has centralized almost all of these decisions under himself, it would be John Brennan. So, since—you know, in Obama’s first term, Brennan has been the one who has been at Obama’s side for all of these national security decisions.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to turn to John Brennan’s remarks last May when he publicly confirmed the United States has used drones to conduct targeted killings overseas.
JOHN BRENNAN: President Obama believes that, done carefully, deliberately and responsibly, we can be more transparent and still ensure our nation’s security. So let me say it as simply as I can: Yes, in full accordance with the law, and in order to prevent terrorist attacks on the United States and to save American lives, the United States government conducts targeted strikes against specific al-Qaeda terrorists, sometimes using remotely piloted aircraft often referred to publicly as “drones.” And I’m here today because President Obama has instructed us to be more open with the American people about these efforts.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s John Brennan, who President Obama, it is said, will be nominating to be head of the CIA. Marcy Wheeler, these comments?
MARCY WHEELER: Well, what your readers, what your listeners should know, first of all, is that John Brennan has lied explicitly about drones in the past. In 2011, 2010, he basically said there had been no civilian casualties at all from drones. So when John Brennan makes public statements—he also had a famous press conference right after the killing of Osama bin Laden where he made a lot of misleading statements, as well. So, when John Brennan says something, you shouldn’t necessarily believe John Brennan. And we know from what he said in that speech, there were specific details that were inaccurate. So, Obama’s notion of being transparent with John Brennan, a proven liar, doesn’t fly.
Moreover, given that we know now—we didn’t know when he made that speech—that John Brennan is the guy who’s basically, like I said, the last decision maker before Obama signs off on drone strikes or not, he has a pretty big incentive to spin the process in such a way that he’s protected legally, because if in fact they’re not using rules, as they appear not to be in all cases, that would abide by international law, he has a quite a bit of exposure. So now he can go out there and claim to be transparent and make this speech about these great standards they’re using, which they’re not, because that—you know, the speech he made doesn’t account for signature strikes, which involve patterns rather than specific intelligence, and it protects him, but it’s not transparency. And the administration has repeatedly refused to be transparent on the most basic issues with regards to their program.
AMY GOODMAN: Last May, John Brennan was the target of a protest by Medea Benjamin of CODEPINK. She disrupted his speech as John Brennan defended U.S. drone strikes.
MEDEA BENJAMIN: How many people are you willing to sacrifice? Why are you lying to the American people and not saying how many innocents have been killed?
MODERATOR: Thank you, ma’am, for expressing your views. There will be time for questions and answers after the presentation.
MEDEA BENJAMIN: I speak out on behalf of Tariq Aziz, a 16-year-old in Pakistan, who was killed because he wanted to document the drone strikes. I speak out on behalf of Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, a 16-year-old born in Denver, killed in Yemen, just because his father was someone we don’t like. I speak out on behalf of the Constitution, on behalf of the rule of law. I love the rule of law. I love my country. You are making us less safe by killing so many innocent people.
AMY GOODMAN: That was Medea Benjamin of CODEPINK as she was carried out of the hearing by security. Marcy Wheeler, what Brennan was saying and what Medea Benjamin was protesting?
MARCY WHEELER: Well, Medea Benjamin referenced two 16-year-olds who were killed, one of whom was a Pakistani who was an activist, basically, against drone strikes, and shortly after he made some public statements, he died in a drone strike. The second one is Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, who, as she said, was an American citizen, and he was killed in a drone strike just a couple weeks after his father.
And it’s funny because there’s been recent comments since, where people in the administration—of course, anonymous people—said, “Oh, well, that was an outrageous mistake, killing Awlaki’s son.” But in fact, under the rules that Brennan touts as being so protective, military-aged males—Awlaki, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki, was 16—are considered militia unless they’re proven not to be. So, that’s the kind of standards we’re using. And, you know, whatever the story is for why Abdulrahman al-Awlaki was killed, what you have is, you know, an American citizen, who there’s no known tie to terrorism, who got killed in one of our drone strikes, presumably because he’s a teenager, and we consider teenagers legitimate targets.
AMY GOODMAN: What about John Brennan’s role under George W. Bush?
MARCY WHEELER: Right. I mean, so he was George Tenet’s chief of staff and then went on to be kind of the precursor to what’s now called the National Counterterrorism Center. And in that role, he touched the early moments of the torture program and, I think more importantly, was involved in the targeting for Cheney’s illegal wireless—warrantless wiretapping program, when it was working without any legal sanction at all. So, as you said at the top of this story, Brennan was considered unacceptable four years ago to lead the CIA. Since then, we’ve learned about his role in the illegal wiretapping program. We’ve learned about his role in drone strikes. And yet, now he’s supposed to be an acceptable candidate? I don’t understand how—I mean, I guess that’s a testament to what kind of hard-nosed person Barack Obama has become and the degree to which his policies really are just a continuation of the Bush-Cheney policies.
AMY GOODMAN: Marcy Wheeler, I want to thank you for being with us, investigative blogger who runs the website EmptyWheel.net, joining us from Michigan. We will continue to follow this news. As we broadcast now, word has come—just come down that President Obama will nominate John Brennan to be head of the CIA. When we come back from break, we’ll look at his other nominee today, Chuck Hagel, the former senator of Nebraska, to head defense. This is Democracy Now! Back in a minute. |
England centre Brad Barritt will miss the autumn internationals through injury, his club Saracens have said.
The 27-year-old has undergone surgery on ligaments in his foot and is expected to return in late 2013.
England host Australia, Argentina and New Zealand in November.
Barritt in numbers 85 Premiership appearances for Saracens
21 Heineken Cup appearances for Saracens
16 England caps
2 Lions appearances
"Brad is a tremendously important player for us and England. He is on the road to recovery and we look forward to his return later this season," said Sarries boss Mark McCall.
"He will be missed through the autumn, although we have talented players ready to step forward."
Barritt has 16 international caps for England and started every Six Nations fixture this year as Stuart Lancaster's side finished runners-up to Wales.
for the Test series in Australia and played in tour matches against the Brumbies and Melbourne Rebels.
He started Saracens' season-opening Premiership victory over London Irish at Twickenham last week, but was left out of the squad for Sunday's visit of Gloucester, |
Image caption Mr Rouhani had a surge of support after endorsement by reformists
Reformist-backed cleric Hassan Rouhani has won Iran's presidential election, securing just over 50% of the vote and so avoiding the need for a run-off.
Crowds gathered in Tehran to hail Mr Rouhani, who said he had achieved a "victory of moderation over extremism".
Some 72.2% of the 50 million eligible Iranian voters cast ballots to choose the successor to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
The US said it was "ready to engage directly" with Iran over its disputed nuclear programme.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei congratulated Mr Rouhani on his victory.
Election results Hassan Rouhani: 18,613,329
Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf: 6,077,292
Saeed Jalili: 4,168,946
Mohsen Rezai: 3,884,412
Ali Akbar Velayati: 2,268,753
Mohammad Gharazi: 446,015
Votes cast: 36,704,156 Iran voters reflect hopes for future Profiles: Iran election candidates
"I urge everyone to help the president-elect and his colleagues in the government, as he is the president of the whole nation," he said.
Ayatollah Khamenei will ratify the vote on 3 August and the new president will then take the oath in parliament.
Mr Rouhani, who has pledged greater engagement with Western powers, said: "This victory is a victory for wisdom, moderation and maturity... over extremism."
But he also urged the world to "acknowledge the rights" of Iran.
He said: "The nations who tout democracy and open dialogue should speak to the Iranian people with respect and recognise the rights of the Islamic republic."
'Different course'
Interior Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar announced that Mr Rouhani had won 18,613,329 of the 36,704,156 votes cast. This represented 50.71% of the vote.
Tehran Mayor Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf won 6,077,292 votes to take second place (16.56%).
At the scene Minutes after the announcement of the final result of the election, people in Tehran showed their happiness by pouring on to the streets. Standing on the roof of the BBC building in northern Tehran, I could hear cars blowing their horns and some people cheering. On the phone a friend excitedly told me how people had left their cars and were walking toward Vali-Asr Square in central Tehran, which has witnessed many of Mr Rouhani's rallies in the past 10 days. The reaction of the people showed how much they trusted the electoral system, after there had been much debate within the opposition about whether to boycott the election or take part. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei sent a message of congratulations to the people and called them the real winners of the election. Iran's supreme leader had urged everyone - even those who do not like the Islamic system but love their country - to vote.
Saeed Jalili came third and Mohsen Rezai fourth.
Mr Najjar said that any challenge by presidential candidates would have to be lodged to the Guardian Council within three days.
The winning candidate needed more than 50% of all ballots cast, including invalid ones, to avoid a run-off.
Crowds gathered in Vali-Asr Square in central Tehran and in Kaj Square in the north-west of the capital to hail the victory.
"Long live reform, long live Rouhani," members of the crowd chanted.
One of them told Reuters news agency: "Many people are holding Rouhani posters. Some are hugging and crying. We are all so happy here. We can't believe there is finally a change."
The US said it respected the vote, although White House spokesman Jay Carney cited concern at censorship and lack of transparency.
The US would "engage Iran directly" to find a "diplomatic solution that will fully address the international community's concerns about Iran's nuclear programme".
The UK Foreign Office urged Mr Rouhani to "set Iran on a different course for the future: addressing international concerns about Iran's nuclear programme... and improving the political and human rights situation for the people of Iran".
France said it was "ready to work" with the new leader.
The question now remains: Will the hardline establishment recognise the message of change that the electorate have sent them? Arash Ahmadi and Amara Sophia Elahi, BBC Monitoring Time for change?
One of Mr Rouhani's main pledges was to try to ease international sanctions imposed on Iran over its nuclear programme.
Iran has been suffering economic hardship, with rising unemployment, a devalued currency and soaring inflation.
BBC diplomatic correspondent Jonathan Marcus says Mr Rouhani's election is not necessarily the moment for a substantive change in Iran's policy, but that even a change in style might offer an opening to the US and key UN Security Council members which would be worth testing for any real sign of flexibility in Tehran.
Endorsement
Voting had been extended by five hours on Friday evening to allow more people to cast their ballots.
Although all six candidates were seen as conservatives, analysts say Mr Rouhani - a 64-year-old cleric often described as "moderate" who has held several parliamentary posts and served as chief nuclear negotiator - has been reaching out to reformists in recent days.
Hassan Rouhani A religious moderate, fluent in English, German, French, Russian and Arabic
The only cleric contesting the Iranian presidential election
Key figure in Iranian politics who has held some of the country's top jobs, including chief nuclear negotiator
Has the backing of two former presidents Rouhani in his own words Profile: Hassan Rouhani
The surge of support for him came after Mohammad Reza Aref, the only reformist candidate in the race, announced on Tuesday that he was withdrawing on the advice of pro-reform ex-President Mohammad Khatami.
Mr Rouhani thus went into polling day with the endorsement of two ex-presidents - Mr Khatami and Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who was disqualified from the race by the powerful Guardian Council, a 12-member body of theologians and jurists.
The hardline candidates included Mr Qalibaf - who is seen as a pragmatic conservative - and nuclear negotiator Mr Jalili - who is said to be very close to Ayatollah Khamenei.
The other three candidates were Mr Rezai, a former head of the powerful Revolutionary Guards, former Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati, and former Telecommunications Minister Mohammad Gharazi.
After the last presidential election in June 2009, millions of Iranians took to the streets to demand a rerun, when the supreme leader dismissed claims by the three defeated candidates of widespread fraud.
No foreign observers monitored this year's election and there have also been concerns that media coverage in the run-up has been unfair.
Many reformist newspapers have been shut down, access to the internet and foreign broadcasters has been restricted, and journalists have been detained. |
It takes real balls for the oil industry to fight against transparency and accountability in the middle of a massive oil spill, but that’s precisely what the American Petroleum Institute (API) is doing at the present moment. Even as the spill pours vast quantities of oil in to the Gulf and threatens Louisiana’s wetlands, API is working hard to defeat an amendment that would require all oil, gas, and mining companies registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to report how much they pay foreign governments for access to resources. The amendment, which supporters are trying to attach to the financial reform bill, is modeled on the Energy Security through Transparency Act, which was introduced last fall by Senators Ben Cardin and Richard Lugar.
“While API supports the goals of the amendment, we oppose the unilateral approach to revenue disclosure taken in the amendment, API feels that requiring only U.S-listed extractive companies to disclose revenues creates a competitive disadvantage for these companies in the global energy marketplace,” the Institute said in a letter to key lawmakers last week. In other words, API opposes the goals of the amendment.
Senator Cardin’s staff offered a rebuttal of the API argument, noting that the amendment applies to a large number of foreign companies as well as U.S.
firms and that it “levels the playing field” because it would require openness about payments to countries that currently offer little or no transparency at all, such as Russia, China, Burma, and Cambodia.
“While BP in particular and the oil industry in general are fighting a PR battle regarding the Gulf of Mexico spill, they are also fighting a political battle on Capitol Hill to ensure that much of their financial transactions around the world remain shrouded in secrecy,” says Ian Gary, senior policy manager for Extractive Industries at Oxfam. |
We’ve seen a lot of great 3D printed deck boxes for Magic: The Gathering and other card games in the past, but this may be our favourite one yet, featuring a platform which moves the deck up and down.
Maker Martin Ankor created this geared box after seeing a few similar designs on Thingiverse. Those required too many separate parts and metal pins for the hinges, so he decided to make something simpler and completely 3D printed.
Ankor tells us that he came up with the mechanism while on a long drive so the design process in CAD only took a few hours.
What you see here is the second iteration which took 15 hours to print. It measures in at 82.8mm wide, 64.4mm deep and 103.2mm tall.
While there are plans for new additions such as a more complex design and embossed details on the sides, you can download this version from Thingiverse.
There is a promise for updates in the future to accommodate different deck sizes, and you can leave a comment on the files if you’d like to request one ahead of time.
The last Magic: The Gathering deck boxes we featured were these simple customisable variants, and another geared version before that. |
Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is not a Democrat. She is neither a liberal nor a progressive.
She masquerades as a progressive social justice champion that gets things done, but she’s essentially no better than Donald Trump.
When you step back and objectively assess the foundation of their history and character, you’ll see parallels.
Their biggest strength is name recognition.
They’re both huge icons who have had to make no effort in introducing themselves to the general public.
Their campaigns are about themselves.
Nothing about either of them suggest they’re selflessly interested in being a servant, rather than a monarch.
After all, Clinton is the woman who, in 2011, said the United States should “start thinking of Iraq as a business opportunity,” for American corporations.
She doesn’t seem to care about the 241,000 militiamen and civilians who died.
Clinton and Trump accumulate and respond to wealth.
Forbes estimated Trump is worth over $4 billion, and Clinton averages between $11 and $53 million, depending on how many Goldman Sachs speeches she gave in a year.
In the last democratic debate, Clinton challenged Bernie Sanders to name a time political contributions have changed her vote.
My favorite occasion, though not the only one, was when as First Lady she fought vehemently against a bill that would have made it harder for working-class Americans to climb out of bankruptcy.
When she was elected to the Senate and took campaign contributions from credit card and insurance companies, she favored the bill and voted to pass it.
Fortunately for Trump, the bill didn’t affect his ability to climb out of the four bankruptcies he’s filed.
Both of these candidates seem like the everyday Americans I want representing my personal lower-to-middle-class interests.
The only thing making Clinton better than Trump is social justice, but only because fighting for equal rights is “cool”.
She campaigned for Barry Goldwater, who opposed the Civil Rights Act, opposed gay marriage until three years ago and can’t even get the feminist vote, according to Time Magazine.
In my article last week, “Hillary Clinton has No Soul,” I outlined how her foreign policy experience is synonymous with deadly.
Trump wants to kill the families of terrorists.
Clinton’s experience is as useful as Trump’s lack of it.
They each have about as much combined foresight as a paper sack, and they both flip-flop on issues.
All of this in comparison to Sanders’ principle message of defending the middle class.
From the beginning, he’s been right about the Iraq War, the Panama Papers, NAFTA and LGBT rights, and defended the same basic principles.
He’s worth less than a million dollars, and his campaign is funded mostly by ordinary Americans, whose average contribution is $27.
By his positive favorability ratings from various sources, he’s the leader America so desperately needs.
If we fail to elect him, we fail only ourselves.
thshowal@indiana.edu
@TherinShowalter
Like what you're reading? Support independent, award-winning college journalism on this site. Donate here. |
When Microsoft introduced its first Surface devices last year, it did so in a staggered fashion. Surface RT showed up first, then four months later Surface Pro went on sale. Despite sharing a lot of the same DNA, the response to Surface Pro was much better than what we saw with Surface RT. While Surface RT suffered a lot from being a new platform that lacked the support of decades of Windows applications, Surface Pro had no such issue.
Instead, Surface Pro offered the promise of a tablet that could potentially replace your notebook and desktop as well. Microsoft’s strategy with Surface Pro mimicked the market transition we saw years earlier. The notebooks that replaced desktops over the 2000s did so by being able to work as both notebooks or desktops. Similarly, Microsoft hoped that Surface Pro could act as both a tablet and a notebook for those users who didn’t want to carry two devices.
By and large, Microsoft was successful in achieving that vision. Although as with all devices that attempt to fulfill multiple roles, Surface Pro presented a set of tradeoffs. It wasn’t as portable and didn’t last as long on a single charge as a conventional ARM based tablet. It also didn’t have the same keyboard or in-lap experience as a PC notebook. You got a compromised experience on both sides of the fence. Just as with Surface 2, Microsoft is committed to a more aggressive update cadence to its Surface Pro hardware as well. Here we are, almost 9 months since availability of the original Surface Pro, reviewing its successor.
Unlike Surface 2, Surface Pro 2 shows almost no signs of change on the outside. It reminds me of the pre-iPhone/iPad era where expecting a dramatic chassis redesign a year after introduction was considered ludicrous. Surface Pro 2 keeps the exact same finish, dimensions and weight as the original Surface Pro.
It’s unfortunate given how much thinner and lighter the device could be this time around. I suspect Microsoft has a three year plan for Surface Pro. It could move to a thinner design this year and drop performance by going to a 6W Haswell SKU, keep performance the same but pay a thermal penalty with a 15W Haswell or wait until Broadwell next year to shrink the chassis (hopefully without much of an associated performance reduction). I can understand why Microsoft chose the latter, it’s still just frustrating as I would’ve loved a thinner/lighter Surface Pro.
I also lament Microsoft’s decision to update the VaporMg finish on Surface 2 but not on Surface Pro 2. I really like the new finish both in feel and in color. Surface 2’s resistance to picking up fingerprints is an added bonus on that front. Alas, it’s an update that I’m guessing the Surface Pro lineup won’t get until next year.
Surface Pro 2 also retains the same front and rear facing cameras as its predecessor, both 1.2MP units and it doesn’t get the new 3.5/5MP sensors from Surface 2.
You still get a bundled Wacom active digitizer with Surface Pro 2, just like with the original. I’m hardly a creative professional, but from what I’ve experienced with the pen it’s really a great addition for those folks who are. I’ll point you at none other than Gabe from Penny Arcade who did a great post on an artist’s perspective of using the Surface Pro’s stylus. Spoiler alert: he likes it a lot. If I illustrated for a living, I probably would too.
Surface Pro 2 inherits the same kickstand and branding decisions as Surface 2. As I mentioned in my Surface 2 review, the new 2-stage kickstand is awesome and a huge improvement over its predecessor. The kickstand now opens at 24 and 40-degree angles, the latter enables more comfortable use when you’re not typing at a desk. The new kickstand also ditches the Windows 8 logo in favor of the Surface logo across the back.
Finally, Surface Pro 2 does get the new 1080p panel from Surface 2 (albeit a brighter implementation). There’s no improvement in resolution compared to the original Surface Pro, but color accuracy is a lot better.
I did notice an odd display corruption issue on Surface Pro 2 when waking up from sleep (pictured above). Resetting the device or sometimes just doing another sleep/wake cycle was enough to fix it. Microsoft tells me it’s aware of the problem and plans to issue an update shortly to address it. We only got review samples a few days prior to the NDA lift, I get the impression that it was a lot of work to get final hardware out the door in time for this launch. Update: Microsoft traced the issue back to a later revision of an Intel graphics driver. After release, a Surface Pro 2 update rolled back to an earlier optimized driver that no longer exhibits the display corruption on wake issue.
Internally we see where Microsoft spent most of its time updating Surface Pro. It all starts with an upgrade to Haswell. Surface Pro 2 features Intel’s Core i5-4200U, a dual-core 1.6GHz 15W Haswell part with Hyper Threading, 3MB of shared L3 cache, and a max turbo frequency of 2.6GHz. Just like last time, I had no issues hitting 2.6GHz on Surface Pro 2. I would see 2.3GHz far more frequently however.
As Surface Pro 2 is rather thick by Ultrabook standards, you get the full performance of the 4200U. I ran a multithreaded Cinebench 11.5 test on Surface Pro 2, comparing it to Apple’s 13-inch 2013 MacBook Air under Windows 8. The two deliver identical performance, just in different form factors:
The 4200U is nearly identical to the base CPU you get in the new 2013 MacBook Airs, the only difference being that you get Intel’s HD 4400 graphics vs. HD 5000. Apple’s obsession with graphics performance explains the difference, although it’s disappointing to see Microsoft not sharing the same obsession. To Microsoft’s credit the difference between Intel’s HD 5000 and HD 4400, when constrained by a 15W TDP, just isn’t very large. The real benefit to going with HD 5000 over HD 4400 has to do with power consumption, since you can get similar performance at lower frequencies/voltages thanks to a doubling of the number of EUs in HD 5000.
It’s not just the CPU that’s changed this time around, Microsoft did extensive work under the hood of Surface Pro 2 to further reduce power consumption. Haswell ULT supports LPDDR3, a feature that Microsoft chose to take advantage of in pursuit of lowering power consumption. All other components on the motherboard are also optimized for power consumption. The result is a device that looks like and is cooled similarly to its predecessor, but is appreciably cooler/quieter in operation. While the original Surface Pro would spin its fans up on a regular basis, Surface Pro 2 is far more hesitant to do the same thing. In what I’d consider to be light to medium tablet use, Surface Pro 2 behaves like a passively cooled device. When the fans do ramp up, they aren’t any louder than before as far as I can tell.
USB3 transfers to an internal mSATA SSD
Just like the original, Surface Pro 2 retains a full SSD rather than an eMMC solution. We’re still dealing with an mSATA based drive here, but Microsoft expanded the available capacity options. The combination of DRAM/SSD/price options are in the table below:
Microsoft Surface Pro 2 Storage Configurations SSD 64GB 128GB 256GB 512GB LPDDR3 Configuration 4GB 4GB 8GB 8GB Price $899 $999 $1299 $1799
The most interesting options are unfortunately the more expensive models. I think the sweet spot is likely the 8GB/256GB version, which also happens to be how my review sample was configured. Unfortunately the LPDDR3 is soldered on board (as with all modern Ultrabooks) so that’s not user upgradeable. The SSD is technically serviceable, but there’s a ton of risk associated with doing so as you have to take apart your Surface Pro 2 to do so. Once again Microsoft refuses to equip Surface Pro with a Thunderbolt port, which would help greatly in dealing with high performance storage expansion concerns. There is still a USB 3.0 port at least.
Surface Pro 2 is compatible with all of the new dock accessories, including the new touch and type covers. I went through the improvements to both of those in our Surface 2 review already, but in short they are great. I still prefer the new type cover as I can type a lot faster on it, but the new touch cover is significantly better than its predecessor. Neither is included in the cost of a Surface Pro 2, so factor in another $119 - $129 depending on which cover you end up with. I noticed the same trackpad disappearing issues on Surface Pro 2 as I did on Surface 2, Microsoft claims a fix is in the works.
Microsoft Surface Pro Comparison Surface Pro 2 Surface Pro Dimensions 10.81 x 6.81 x 0.53" 10.81 x 6.81 x 0.53" Display 10.6-inch 1920 x 1080 w/ Improved Color Accuracy 10.6-inch 1920 x 1080 PLS Weight 2.0 lbs 2.0 lbs Processor Core i5-4200U with HD4400 Graphics (15W Haswell ULT) Core i5-3317U with HD4000 Graphics (17W Ivy Bridge) Cameras 1.2MP/1.2MP (front/rear) 1.2MP/1.2MP (front/rear) Connectivity WiFi WiFi Memory 4GB or 8GB LPDDR3 4GB Storage 64 or 128GB (4GB RAM)
256GB or 512GB (8GB RAM) 64GB or 128GB Battery 42.0 Wh 42.0 Wh Starting Price $899 $799
Surface Pro 2 ships with Windows 8.1 Pro x64. Since there's no connected standby 64-bit version of Windows 8/8.1 yet, Surface Pro 2 ships without the feature. It also continues to behave more notebook like in the sleep/wake sense as a result. There's a delay between when you press the power/lock button and when you'll see the tablet respond as the system comes out of its sleep state. Ironically Surface Pro 2 comes with nothing more than a link to try Office 2013, while Surface 2 comes with a free copy of the Home & Student edition. |
Before there were icons and logos, there were flags. For centuries, people have been devising simple shapes and colours to symbolize complex ideas.
With hundreds of countries in the world, there are bound to be some oddly coincidental similarities among their flags. Here are some that I found.
There are many others that also have similarities, but this is because they share histories, ethnicities or religions. I haven’t included them.
Thailand and Costa Rica are on opposite sides of the world, yet their flags are the same — with reversed colours.
The flag of Poland is the reverse of Indonesia and Monaco, which are identical. Singapore is also the same except that it has a moon and stars.
The flags of Italy and Mexico are almost the same except Mexico has a decoration in the middle. Ireland is also close except that it ends with orange instead of red. Côte d’Ivoire is the reverse of Ireland.
India and Niger have close to the same colours with a round object in the middle. Hungary is also close, but with a plain centre.
The flags of Romania and Chad are the same. Andorra is also the same except it has an emblem in the middle. Belgium is close — starting with black, instead of blue.
Netherlands and Paraguay are close to the same, with the addition of an emblem for Paraguay.
Ghana and Bolivia have the same colour combination but different embellishments.
Austria and Latvia are red with a horizontal white stripe in the middle. Lebanon is similar but also has a cedar in the middle.
Bangladesh, Japan, Laos, Palau and Greenland all have a big dot.
Somalia, Vietnam and Morocco have a big star on a one-colour background.
Three flags use maps of their territory: Cyprus, Kosovo and Antarctica.
Bhutan and Wales both have dragons.
Basque Country and the United Kingdom have crosses on top of each other.
Malaysia and the United States both have a blue canton and stripes.
And finally we have Nigeria in west Africa and Norfolk Island — a territory of Australia in the direction of New Zealand — with nothing in common except, you guessed it, their flags. That’s an evergreen that distinguishes the Norfolk Island flag.
Credit: Flag icons from GoSquared.
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President-elect Donald Trump has been dismissing findings about his historically-low approval rating on Twitter lately, so Stephen Colbert used his monologue during Tuesday’s episode of The Late Show to mock the president-elect’s tweets.
“He’s got the lowest approval rating of any incoming president in modern history, but hey it’s not a popularity contest and neither was the election,” Colbert said. On Tuesday, Trump, whose approval ratings recently hit a low of 40%, according to new polls, tweeted “The same people who did the phony election polls and were so wrong, are now doing approval rating polls. They are rigged just like before.”
“Yes, evidently any bad news for Trump is rigged,” Colbert said, referencing the tweet. The host even created a fake Trump tweet of his own in the event of rain on inauguration day. “Fake weather. Clouds are rigged. Apologize!”
Colbert also took on Trump’s tweet attacking Democratic Congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis on Twitter Saturday with another parody tweet that lampooned the incoming President’s comments on President Barack Obama and Senator John McCain, this time with an Easter twist.
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“Loser Jesus dead for 3 days and then we’re supposed to believe he just wakes up? Fake news. I like gods who don’t die. Where’s the rebirth certificate?”
Watch the full clip above.
Write to Ashley Hoffman at Ashley.Hoffman@time.com. |
You can't shoot an arrow on TV these days without hitting a series that was adapted from a comic book, with the majority of the fare falling somewhere beneath the overarching banner of "superhero drama." From Marvel's Daredevil to The CW's Arrow to Fox's Gotham, almost every network has a superhero series, and if they don't, they will soon enough. But how do the different series stack up against each other? We love ranking things on the internet, and so in honor of National Superhero Day (it's a thing, I swear), I've gathered TV's biggest, boldest, and brightest super-powered shows and ranked them from least good to absolute best. Do you agree or disagree? And did I miss a current series that you think should fall under this umbrella?
6. Gotham (Fox)
Gotham is a superhero show in the sense that it exists within the DC Universe and features characters present in the comic books, but there's no dodging the fact the Fox drama is the weakest addition to this list. Ben McKenzie's Jim Gordon was a compelling jumping off point for Gotham, but the Fox drama is populated with too many lifeless characters who take themselves far too seriously for a series that also employs the use of Baby Batman and Baby Catwoman. The Penguin's arc has kept Gotham from being labeled a total trainwreck, but then you remember that Fish Mooney also exists, and so here we are in dead last.
5. Arrow (The CW)
A year ago, Arrow likely would have taken the lead spot on this list, but the battle for Oliver Queen's humanity that has consumed Season 3 is a step down from the wild ride the series presented in Season 2, thanks to the commanding presence of Manu Bennett's Slade Wilson. Ra's al Ghul has failed to live up to the hype in a storyline that's supported by the flimsiest of foundations, while characters like Felicity have been dragged through the mud to service Oliver's ongoing struggle with identity. The lone highlight to this underwhelming season is Oliver's bond with Thea, but that can't carry a series that doesn't seem to care about everything that once made it great.
4. Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (ABC)
After a strong finish to its freshman season, Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has been consistently entertaining and largely on-point in terms of quality in Season 2. By introducing fun new characters like Bobbi Morse and Lance Hunter, the series has expanded its core cast, while still allowing room for original agents to grow. But as fun as Season 2 has been, the series is still far from perfect. The character responsible for Season 1's exciting end (Brett Dalton's Grant Ward) was largely sidelined, while the introduction of the Inhumans and a second version of S.H.I.E.L.D. led to several episodes of exposition that slowed momentum. Still, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. remains a fun exercise in making a superhero series about the little guys who are super.
3. Marvel's Agent Carter (ABC)
If you're asking why Marvel's Agent Carter is on this list, then you probably didn't watch Marvel's Agents Carter and that's a damn shame. Tight writing, intriguing villains, and a vibrant and self-confident heroine made Agent Carter one of the most exciting series this year. Hayley Atwell's titular character was a unicorn in the 1940s as the lone female agent in the Strategic Scientific Reserve, and Agent Carter stands alone again as the only series on this list to be headlined by a woman. When Peggy wasn't busy kicking ass and solving problems like it was no big deal, she was staring down the sexism of the era and putting her colleagues in their place. In the end, Peggy didn't even need credit for saving the world, which is how you know she was a true superhero.
2. The Flash (The CW)
The difference between the two series at the top of this list probably comes down to a matter of personal taste, because they're equally impressive. The Flash embraces its comic-book origins and uses them to its advantage to showcase a young man who willingly and excitedly throws himself into the role of being a superhero. Barry Allen and The Flash stand out, especially when compared to the tortured existence of say, Arrow's Oliver Queen, by offering a thrilling, lighter look at the genre. The series has also found a way to successfully mesh a compelling overarching plot with episodic elements, like the metahumans of the week, which allows for plenty of fun cameos.
1. Marvel's Daredevil (Netflix)
In contrast to The Flash, the darkness that surrounds Marvel's Daredevil is gripping and often suffocating, but it's also one of the series' greatest strengths. Existing outside the limits of broadcast television not only allows Daredevil to take risks in terms of its stylized violence, but also in its pulpy storytelling. The care that's given to the rise of Charlie Cox's Daredevil is also given to Vincent D'Onofrio's Kingpin, which creates a well-rounded world for the series to play in, and it's one that isn't often explored in a superhero series. An excellent supporting cast, incredible action sequences, and the know-how to successfully incorporate flashbacks, all combine to make Daredevil the best superhero drama on TV.
Okay, now it's your turn. What's the best superhero show on TV right now? And let's see your rankings in the comments.
thekaitling:list:what-is-the-best-superhero-series-on-tv/ |
I'm itching to release this build as it already fixed a lot of issues for quite a few users, but since it includes changes to very sensitive download folder management code I'm a little wary of releasing it just yet. I'm hoping you guys can try it out and let me know if you run into any new problems or whether it works well for you after some time. Changes include:
Remote folder structures with more than one level of subfolders should now be properly recreated locally, and not flattened as before.
By default, the top-level folder for each download is the name of the user the file was downloaded from. Thank you grinsanscat for suggesting this! The behavior can be turned off under Options->File Sharing.
Files with illegal filename characters should now properly download on Windows.
All empty subfolders in the 'downloading' folder are now erased after every download.
Close all searches button. Also thanks to grinsanscat!
Qt 5.9.1 seems to work better for a number of Windows 10 users.
First time using AppImage for the Linux build! Hopefully works on most Linux distributions.
11/21: Rolled back to Qt 5.8 for the Mac build due to a yet unresolved UI bug. Other updates since the 7/29 build include minor fixes discussed in this thread.
Windows: https://www.dropbox.com/s/mpa4oqhr1aeju44/SoulseekQt-2017-11-21.exe?dl=1
Mac: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ruvio22uu1onddi/SoulseekQt-2017-11-21.dmg?dl=1
Linux 64-bit: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ru2mvycljfrejcx/SoulseekQt-2017-11-21-64bit.tg...
Let me know on this forum thread!
Thanks, Nir |
Steve Adcock ... director of photography: second unit
Bob Akester ... still photographer
Tim Atkins ... gaffer
Mike Bolan ... grip: second unit
Marc Brunelle ... lamp operator (as Mark Brunelle)
Terry Calhoun ... best boy: second unit (as Terrance Calhoun)
Paul Cunningham ... gaffer: second unit
Mike Dubé ... best boy (as Mike Dube)
Todd Fairbairn ... lamp operator
Douglas R. Field ... camera operator: "b" camera, second unit (as Doug Field)
Aris Georgiopoulos ... first assistant camera (as Aristidi Georgiopoulos)
Ryan Gillard ... second assistant camera: second unit
Gary Hornbeck ... lamp operator: second unit
Junichi Hosoi ... camera operator (as Jun Hosoi)
Kieran Humphries ... first assistant camera: second unit (as Kieran Humphrey)
Michael Iwan ... dolly grip (as Mike Iwan)
Stephen Jackson ... gaffer: second unit (as Steve Jackson)
James Kantola ... grip
Gene Keigher ... rigging grip
Regine Klein ... grip
John Lambert ... director of photography: second unit
Robert Little ... best boy: second unit (as Bob Little)
Nelson Martin ... generator operator: second unit
Álex Martínez ... second assistant camera (as Alex Martinez)
Shawn Milsted ... best boy: second unit (as Shawn Milstead)
Robert C. New ... director of photography: second unit (as Robert New)
Tara Nicholson ... second assistant camera: "b" camera, second unit (as Tara Nicolson)
Paul Prince ... first assistant camera: "b" camera, second unit
Douglas Pruss ... first assistant camera: second unit (as Doug Pruss)
Mike Sanchez ... playback / video assist
Eike Schroter ... still photographer (as Eike Schroeder)
Jennifer Sinclair ... second assistant camera: second unit
Brian Smith ... key grip
Jeff Smith ... lead hand grip: second unit
Andrew Spencer-Phillips ... best boy: second unit
John Spencer-Phillips ... key grip: second unit
Mark Spohr ... lamp operator
Rene Spooner ... rigging gaffer
Jay 'Sully' Sullivan ... grip (as Jason 'Sully' Sullivan)
Jeff Trebenski ... generator operator: second unit
Gordon VanHumbeck ... best boy (as Gordon Vanhumbeck)
Mark Weinhaupl ... camera trainee
Mike West ... dolly grip: second unit
Brian Whittred ... director of photography: second unit
Ed Willems ... lead man set up (as Ed W. Willems)
R. Brock Woodman ... grip: second unit (as Brock Woodman)
Kosto Zeviar ... generator operator |
Karl Stefanovic laughs off appearance in Islamic State propaganda video
Posted
Channel Nine presenter Karl Stefanovic has laughed off his appearance in a new Islamic State (IS) propaganda video, encouraging the terrorist group to tune into the Today show.
The 12-minute video, released on the encrypted Telegram Messenger service, shows chaotic scenes following the San Bernardino shooting and the Paris attacks, both of which were claimed by IS.
Footage of armed soldiers running through the streets and emergency responders carrying a person on a stretcher are shown in the video, which appeals for new recruits.
The narrator praises IS attacks and the video also includes interviews with people who describe an idyllic life under IS.
The video, titled "So we will give him a good life", then cuts to a clip of Stefanovic in a panicked scramble while reporting live outside Le Carillon bar following the Paris attacks.
While Stefanovic was preparing to cross to the Today show, nearby firecrackers caused a stampede to break out on the street behind him.
On Twitter on Thursday, Stefanovic responded to his appearance in the video with humour: "Make sure all you isil bastards tune in Monday. We are giving away heaps of cash and good times."
Twitter users have praised the presenter's response. The Nine Network declined to comment.
IS has featured other well-known figures in previous recruitment videos including US President Barack Obama and former presidents Bill Clinton and George Bush.
ABC/AAP
Topics: terrorism, media, australia |
The geoglyphs in the gorge of Santo Domingo in Trujillo continue to face invasion by agricultural invaders The destruction of a 600-year-old geoglyph in Trujillo made headlines in April after agricultural invaders attempted to erase the structure to make room for crops.
Since the incident was discovered investigators have searched the region to find out that hundreds in the area have been destroyed and remain in danger.
El Comercio reported yesterday, two months after the destruction, that the geoglyphs continue to face invasion and threats from agricultural invaders.
On May 21, the Ministry of Culture announced 250 hectares of previously destroyed geoglyphs had been restored.
Despite few advancements, in the district of Laredo in Trujillo, the Santo Domingo gorge is still seeking protection and continues to be invaded.
Residents in the Santo Domingo area told El Comercio that the lands had in fact been sold about four years ago to lawyers. They paid between S/. 3,000 and S/. 4,000 for each lot obtained.
Comments
comments |
TAMPA, FL (WFLA) - The City of Tampa passed an ordinance Thursday that will lessen the punishment for possessing marijuana within city limits. The city council passed the measure with a vote of 5 to 1.
People caught with 20 grams or less of marijuana will face a lesser punishment.
"Today we have an opportunity to do what's right and what's good for the citizens in this community," Councilman Frank Reddick said.
The intent of the ordinance is to help young people who make mistakes.
"What we're attempting to do is put a stop to that pipeline to prison that affect so many of our young people, especially our young people of color," Councilwoman Lisa Montelione said.
Before the ordinance, people were charged with a misdemeanor if caught with 20 grams or less or marijuana. You could face jail time or the loss of your license.
Now, those caught with 20 grams or less of pot will instead pay a citation - almost like getting a traffic ticket.
"I don't feel what we did today is different than what a lot of cities are doing and as a country as we're moving nationally," Montelione said.
Mom of three Ellen Snelling said there should be a cap on the number of times someone is caught. She used her daughter's struggle with marijuana as an example.
"Arrest is not the end of the world. My daughter was arrested; she went to juvenile drug court. She's doing great today. She's drug free," Snelling said. "When somebody is using a substance that is addictive and can be abused, just paying a fine is not going to help them."
Under the measure, people who possess 20 grams or less of marijuana will be issued a $75 citation for the first offense and a $150 citation for the second offense. Citations will be $300 or more for additional offenses.
Charlie Miranda was the only council member to vote against the ordinance. |
Prepare for the merciless action and brutal hand-to-hand combat of FIST OF THE NORTH STAR: KEN’S RAGE.
Put your martial arts skills to the test against masses of bloodthirsty enemies in this no-holds-barred action brawler ripped from the pages of the popular manga classic. A ravaged Earth struggles to survive after a nuclear holocaust has left the world in ruins. Survivors band together in communities and villages, living off what little resources remain. In the wastelands beyond, vicious gangs prey on the survivors for their resources, or sometimes merely for sport.
A mysterious martial artist named Ken, a man with seven scars on his chest and the chosen successor of the legendary assassin’s art Hokuto Shinken (北斗神拳, The Divine Fist of the North Star) has sworn to protect the weak and innocent from the malicious gangs roaming the scorched planet. |
French photojournalist Mathias Depardon deported from Turkey after month in detention
GAZİANTEP
A French photojournalist detained in May by Turkish police while on assignment in the southeast has been deported, the French President’s Office and activist group Reporters sans Frontieres said on June 9.Mathias Depardon was detained on May 8 while on assignment for National Geographic magazine in Hasankeyf, in the southeastern province of Batman. He has been held since then at a deportation center in the southeastern province of Gaziantep, despite reports he would be deported.Reporters Without Borders (RSF) stated on Twitter that Depardon was on an airplane to Istanbul and would arrive in Paris in the evening.On the same day, the journalist saw his mother for the first time since he was detained in an “emotional” meeting.“It was very emotional for both sides. I saw my son crying because he was so moved,” Daniele Van de Lanotte told AFP outside the detention center after seeing her son, who turned 37 this week.“I am relieved to see him, it is quite a gift,” Van de Lanotte, 66, said. “He looked pretty good.”“We brought him many books, clothes and newspapers,” she added.Two weeks after he was detained, Depardon went on hunger strike, stopping almost a week later when he learned that a consular visit would be allowed.A French consul representative based in Ankara, Christophe Hemmings, was allowed an hour-long visit with Depardon, according to Deloire.The visit may have been granted due to a promise Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan made to his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron on May 25 during the NATO summit that he would “rapidly” look into Depardon’s case, Macron’s office said.The Turkish authorities have said he was detained over “propaganda for a terror group” - a reference to the outlawed Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) - and this could lead to a judicial investigation.His mother was accompanied on her visit by Hemmings and RSF Secretary-General Christophe Deloire.“Mathias Depardon must be released now,” Deloire said. |
As web designers, it’s easy for us to become myopic and lose sight of the world of design outside of our own niche. However, one of the best ways to grow as a designer is to shift gears and look for inspiration in completely different areas. Today, let’s head south and ditch pixels in favor of an unexpected source of design inspiration – tequila bottles.
It’s easy to dismiss the appearance of a tequila bottle when a margarita beckons us, but the bottle design is definitely worth a second glance. A dedicated observance of Mexican heritage is visually apparent in the packaging of many types of tequila. Made from a plant called blue agave, this beverage is typically distilled in the higher elevations of the Mexican state of Jalisco. A proud Mexican spirit is apparent in the label and bottle design of a number of high-end tequilas.
Inspirational Tequila Bottle Design
Each of the bottle designs featured below integrates a unique aspect; try to think of how you could apply each to your digital designs.
Historical Artwork
Espolón, a premium quality brand, updated their label design in 2010 to represent the celebrated “real Mexico” culture. Ramon the rooster, an iconic symbol of national pride, can be found carrying one of the brave revolutionists on Espolón’s Tequila Blanco label, in the fight for independence from Spain.
The labels are illustrated using the traditional “Dia de los Muertos” (Day of the Dead) style filled with skeletons and skulls, common representations of this Mexican holiday. The use of black and white illustration allows the word Espolón, printed in a brightly colored sans-serif font, to stand out.
In addition to the illustrative nature of the label, the bottle itself is wide and low, setting it apart from other brands. This design decision is also functional in nature – the wide bottle gives the label more surface area, and therefore the prominence that it deserves.
The flawless artistic execution by the package designer makes for a memorable tequila bottle, but the true genius of Espolon’s packaging is the ability to tell an interesting visual story about Mexican history using only a small label as its canvas.
Metallurgy and Textures
Ancestra’s Single Barrel Añejo employs a different approach to its packaging. Although the shape of the hand blown glass bottle is fairly common, Ancestra produces metal “labels” for the front of their bottles in place of a typical adhesive label.
Metallurgy played a large part in Mexican history, dating back as far as 800 AD, so the use of such an important material on a tequila bottle seems appropriate.
The stamped letters give the packaging a tactile quality, while the reflective metal itself lends a glossy aspect to a usually matte surface. The metal tarnishes over time, a reference to the aged quality of the tequila inside. A decorative typeface and simple logo add a bit of ornamentation, offsetting the industrial feel of the hard substance.
The type of material is key here; the packaging would be very ordinary if the label were made of the usual adhesive paper.
Shape, Simplicity and Placement
The use of metallic elements continues with DeLeón Tequila, a relatively new addition to the market. DeLeón uses a combination of classic designs and modern lines in its packaging. Dia de los Muertos-style embellishment sits atop the vessel in the form of a metal bottle stopper, a nod to Mexico’s storied history. The textured aspect of the cap will not go unnoticed, as this is the part of the bottle that the consumer will touch the most.
The front of the bottle is sandblasted with the DeLeón logo, a gothic-style letterform, for a subtle yet memorable brand reminder that does not obstruct your view of the premium spirit inside. The black label on one side of the glass bottle mimics the style used on the ornate metal top – silver on black.
Familiar Artwork
In sharp contrast to the monochromatic DeLeon bottle, the 1800 Limited Edition Essential Artist Series emphasizes the colorful styles of artists such as Chad Shore, SteveOramA and Michelle Villasenor. Chad Shore’s design portrays a 60’s-style inspired woman with a blank face consisting of only a mouth. Although this design does not outwardly refer to Mexican history, the artist is known for drawing inspiration from his own community in Atlanta, Georgia.
Instead of attracting buyers using familiar Mexican imagery, 1800 has decided to take advantage of the fame and familiarity of these artists to lure potential customers toward their brand. It should be noted, however, that 1800 did not change the bottle shape for the limited edition series; by doing so, they were able to maintain a certain level of brand recognition.
Geometry, Ornamentation and Minimalism
Moving from a common household name to a lesser-known high-end tequila, Corzo’s sleek and modern bottle unites perfectly with its simple label. The bottle, developed by renowned perfume bottle designer Fabien Barou, was intended to reflect the strong rectangular shapes often found in modern Mexican architecture. To then contradict this appealing simplicity with an ornate label would seem ridiculous – the sophisticated serif font and bright lettering exist in harmony with the shapely, boxlike glass container.
Even the spout was taken into consideration, unlike many other brands. Corzo has created an offset flat spout with a hidden cork, supposedly shaped to enhance pouring accuracy. A centered spout would have been the easy solution; Corzo took the design a step further though, adding detail at the top of the bottle also.
Preeminence of Form, Sentimental Association
Kah Tequila makes an extreme reference to the Dia de Los Muertos, with an ornately decorated skull-shaped bottle. More than just a marketing ploy, it is inspired by the Calaveras (skulls made of sugar) used during the Dia de los Muertos rituals to symbolize death and rebirth. The Calaveras are given to family and friends who are invited to eat the sugar skulls, hence acknowledging that death is no more than passing from one life into the next. Because of this strong visual parallel, Kah Tequila invokes a powerful sentiment in those who are familiar with this tradition. For those who are not, the uniqueness of the bottle is enough to set it apart from its competitors.
Both the shape of the bottle and its ornate markings make for a memorable drinking experience.
Reference to Source
Milagro’s Unico Tequila stands out from the crowd with a tall, thin bottle and a hand-blown glass agave plant protruding up into the bottom of the vessel. The founders of the brand wanted to develop a product that would represent modern day Mexico City, a place filled with innovative architecture yet also built on a strong traditional foundation. The slim bottle towers over the others on the shelf, accomplishing a metaphorical height over the competition.
Unico, a super premium limited edition blend, even adheres to this juxtaposition of new and old – combining old world distilling traditions with modern innovation. Strategically placing the label at the top of the lanky bottle leads the eye upward from the hand blown glass agave plant all the way to the company’s logo at the very top. This unusual approach sets it apart from the rest of the pack. The label itself is not so much the draw here, as much as its placement and the bottle itself.
Color Appeal
Oro de Jalisco Reposado Rosse Tequila is housed in a uniquely shaped bottle as well; however, this one is short and squat with a shape reminiscent of a pear.
The use of the agave plant as decoration can be seen on this handmade bottle as well, only in this case it is used as a textural element rather than a sculptural one. By placing the agave plants around the bottom of the vessel, it becomes suggestive of a crystal decanter – probably a deliberate choice on the part of the designer.
Metallic text graces this label also, but this time a fancy gold script was the font of choice. The decorative script fits perfectly with the pink hue of the rosse. Speaking of color – the tequila is aged for eight months in French wine barrels, giving it the unique rose shade. Because the bottle is made of clear glass, the color of the tequila actually adds to the design of the overall product, giving it an interesting monochromatic feel.
Nostalgic Association
Here we have a hand-painted bottle, Clase Azul’s blue and white ceramic decanter designed by artist Tomas Saldivar. It takes three hours for local communities to craft each one, numbering them as they go. Because they are handmade, each decanter is slightly different; this offers an air of exclusivity to the brand, giving it that one-of-a-kind quality that consumers often crave these days.
Pottery is a prevalent part of Mexican history, dating back to ancient times. Using clay to create a vessel for Clase Azul’s tequila seems appropriate given the traditional manner in which the alcohol is distilled. In addition to the hand-painted elements, Clase Azul added a metallic agave medallion to the front of the bottle.
The logo, designed by renowned artist Leon Fernandez, lends a bit of modern flair to the overall design.
Conclusion
Although all of these tequilas are very different from one another, they are all in some way rooted in local culture or history. When we go to Photoshop to create our designs for the web, do we have this same awareness of culture and history? In our effort to appeal to a worldwide audience on the web, I think we too often overlook the rich and unique heritage that each of us brings to the table. How can you integrate culture and history into your designs?
There is a certain attention to detail apparent in all of the tequilas listed above; it is fascinating to compare the vastly different marketing techniques used by each company. The taste of the tequila plays a large part in the success of a brand, but sometimes the creativity of the packaging is just as critical. Imagine seeing each of these tequilas together on a liquor store shelf – which one would you pick?
I hope that the creative details on all of these bottles have helped to get your creative juices flowing, so you can approach your designs with some fresh inspiration. If you can create websites that exude as much character as these bottles, you’ll be in good shape! |
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DICE has revealed more details about the next iteration of its social tracking service Battlelog for Battlefield 4.
The service can now sit on your mobile or tablet device while you're playing, acting as a second screen that shows information on the map and allied player positions.
Players can also use their mobile device to customise their loadouts, browse servers, and see the status of their friends.
Other features include new regional leaderboards, which allow players to see who is the best player in their local region. Players can also set up their own custom missions between friends, with DICE setting up challenges to see who can blow up the most enemy vehicles in a round as an example.
DICE introduced Battlelog alongside 2011's Battlefield 3, with the social service designed to keep track of players' activities and achievements within the game. The PC version of the game is launched directly from Battlelog itself.
Battlefield 4 will launch on the PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 on October 29, with Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions also in the works. |
Philippa shares a video by Nadia Kamil which applies the tropes of victim-blaming campaigns to drunk driving advice.
On the issue of rape victim blaming that Laura wrote about this morning, Nadia Kamil has created this rather fantastic video about how to avoid being hit by a drunk driver. It’s less than a minute long and you will be very glad you watched it.
Transcript and video description:
Text: “Drunk driver safety”.
[The narrator, a woman, is standing on a street in front of a terraced house. She walks towards the camera.] Most drinking happens at night, so avoid leaving your home – at night. And if you are going to stay in your home, make sure to stay in a room away from the road, in case a drunk driver smashes into the front of your home.
[Cut to narrator walking down a path in a park.] If you do have to go out, then avoid anywhere where drunk drivers may be driving. Take alleyways and park pathways.
[Cut to narrator in the driving seat of a parked car.] Avoid dressing like a beer, wine or cocktail, as a drunk driver may mistake you for an alcoholic drink. Don’t even risk dressing up like a Baileys or a Tia Maria, as a drunk driver may swerve off the road, even for a dash of sherry. [Swigs from bottle of spirits.] Be safe out there. [Turns on ignition.]
Text: “You don’t blame victims of drunk drivers. Stop blaming victims of sexual assault. 100% of rapes are the fault of the rapist.” |
The UK Royal Air Force halted operations with its brand-new Airbus A330 Voyager tanker/transports for 12 days last month after a pilot’s improperly-stowed camera became jammed next to one of its side-stick controls in flight and caused a sudden loss of altitude, according to a newly-published report.
“The incident involving Voyager ZZ333 occurred on 9 February 2014 when the aircraft suddenly pitched down while in the cruise at Flight Level 330 (33,000ft),” the UK Military Aviation Authority (MAA) says in an interim report. “Within 27sec the aircraft lost 4,440ft in height, before the self-protection system initiated a recovery back towards controlled flight.” The maximum recorded rate of descent was approximately 15,000ft/min, it adds.
In its 19 March report, the MAA highlights the catalogue of events leading to the incident, which happened in Turkish airspace during a planned non-stop air transport flight between RAF Brize Norton in the UK and Camp Bastion, Afghanistan. The aircraft was carrying nine crew members and 189 passengers.
With the aircraft’s autopilot engaged and while its co-pilot was away from the cockpit in the forward galley, crew members reported feeling a sudden “jolt”, before encountering a sensation of weightlessness as the aircraft rapidly entered a nose-down attitude. “The resulting negative g forces were sufficient for almost all of the unrestrained passengers and crew to be thrown towards the ceiling, resulting in a number of minor injuries,” the report says. “The co-pilot struck the cabin roof, but was able to re-enter the flight-deck through the open door,” it adds.
The two crew members recovered control after the Captain had attempted to disconnect the autopilot, first by pulling back on their side-stick controls and moving the thrust levers to idle, and then by restoring them to take-off and go-around power as the twin-jet returned to a level attitude. The aircraft was then diverted to Incirlik air base in Turkey without further incident.
Crown Copyright
“The flight data recorder has shown no indication of system failures which could have led the aircraft to pitch-down,” the MAA says. “Moreover, the Inquiry has found no evidence of unsolved comparable incidents in any A330 variants.”
Instead, it says it is confident that human factors were to blame, pointing to “a digital SLR camera obstruction which was in front of the Captain’s left arm rest and behind the base of the Captain’s side-stick at the time of the event”. The camera body experienced a “significant compression… consistent with having been jammed between the arm rest and the side-stick unit”, it adds. “Analysis of the camera has confirmed that it was being used in the 3min leading up to the event,” while data recorders also note the Captain’s seat being moved forward “at the onset of the event”.
The MAA says it is continuing its Service Inquiry into the incident and “post-occurrence management of the event”, but notes that simulations have successfully replicated the same pitch-down effect after objects have become inadvertently lodged in the same space. “Safety advice has been issued to the RAF and to Airbus to highlight this possibility,” it says.
With its Lockheed TriStar tanker/transports due to be retired on 31 March, the RAF's fleet of AirTanker-provided Voyagers is poised to assume the bulk of the UK's military passenger transport tasks and all in-flight refuelling duties for the service. |
A state representative from Winona who urged in a weekend Facebook post that those who support the removal of Confederate monuments be lynched has apologized.
Rep. Karl Oliver, R-Winona, wrote: “The destruction of these monuments, erected in the loving memory of our family and fellow Southern Americans, is both heinous and horrific. If the, and I use this term extremely loosely, “leadership” of Louisiana wishes to, in a Nazi-ish fashion, burn books or destroy historical monuments of OUR HISTORY, they should be LYNCHED! Let it be known, I will do all in my power to prevent this from happening in our State.”
Oliver emailed a statement late Monday morning saying “I deeply regret that I chose this word.” However the Facebook post had not been deleted at the time of his apology.
House Speaker Philip Gunn condemned Oliver’s post in an emailed statement Monday morning. The comments “do not reflect the views of the Republican Party, the leadership of the House of Representatives or the House as a whole,” Gunn said.
“Using the word ‘lynched’ is inappropriate and offensive,” Gunn continued. “We call on Rep. Oliver to apologize.”
Gov. Phil Bryant released a statement in an email: “Rep. Oliver’s language is unacceptable and has no place in civil discourse.”
Oliver’s post, put up Saturday evening, included a photo of the statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee, the last of four statues in New Orleans to be removed.
Messages left for Oliver, who is a funeral director, at his workplace and on his cell phone were not immediately returned.
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New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu first publicly called for the removal of four of the city’s Confederate monuments in June 2015.
In effect, Oliver is calling in his Facebook post for the mayor of New Orleans to be lynched. Oliver represents the community of Money, where 14-year-old Emmett Till was lynched 62 years ago.
AP photo, Rogelio V. Solis
Gunn’s statement Monday morning was among the first public reaction from state Republican leaders. Gunn has previously called for replacing the state flag, which displays the Confederate battle emblem.
Two state representatives, John Read, R-Gautier, and Doug McLeod, R-Lucedale, liked the Facebook post.
“Like all members of the House, Representative Oliver reserves the right to voice his opinion on any matter he chooses,” said a statement sent on behalf of the House of Representatives. “However, that opinion does not necessarily reflect that of his fellow legislators.”
Rogelio V. Solis, AP
“The shameful, but seemingly extremely comfortable, choice of words used by my colleague Rep. Karl Oliver, were offensive to me as the act of lynching was commonly used and most targeted toward African American men, women and children in the south and especially in our state,” said Rep. Sonya Williams-Barnes, D-Gulfport. She is head of the Legislative Black Caucus.
“I commend Louisiana’s leaders for taking the brave stance to remove the offensive monuments from public areas in their city,” she continued. “It is time for Mississippi to make similar strides as many in our state find the state flag offensive and non-representing of all Mississippi residents.”
“Lynch” is defined as “to put to death (as by hanging) by mob action without legal approval or permission.”
In the South, the term is most commonly associated with violence by whites against blacks in the late 19th century through the civil rights era. A recent report by the Equal Justice Initiative, a nonprofit that provides legal aid to low-income individuals, estimates there were almost 4,000 lynchings of African Americans in the South from 1877 to 1950.
“Racial terror lynching was a tool used to enforce Jim Crow laws and racial segregation—a tactic for maintaining racial control by victimizing the entire African American community, not merely punishment of an alleged perpetrator for a crime,” the report states.
Although the fate of the statues is unclear, the city will receive proposals from groups that want to take three of the monuments and display them, NPR reported.
Contributing: Kayleigh Skinner |
The Chad-Darfur Safari
Follow along in the journey of two pathetic 419 scammers into one of the most violent and desolate places on earth, the Chad/Sudan border, where hundreds of thousands of Sudanese refugees have fled to avoid being killed by Sudanese guerillas.
The Barrister Koffi Kuku, sends "two associates" to go and steal $145,000.00 from the elderly Rev. Kuhm Belcher, a priest from the Church of Goodwill who has been assigned by his church to aid the refugee camps along the Chad/Sudan border. Rev. Belcher has received a sizable corporate donation to combat the suffering in the region. The problem is, the good Reverend is many miles away from any kind of bank to deposit the money into. Mr. Kuku has graciously offered to help.
Read more background info... |
Richard Taylor, a keen observer and Freedom of Information Act request expert, blogs:
Observing History - Heathrow Robbery Trial Starts Without Jury [...] This morning I went to the Royal Courts of Justice to personally witness the start of the first modern criminal trial in the UK where the defendants have been denied a jury.
That should probably say "England & Wales" rather than "the UK", given the Diplock courts in Northern Ireland.
My views on this are: * It a terrible indictment on our police that they are unable to protect jurors and haven't been able to bring those disrupting the judicial process to justice themselves.
* By removing the right to a jury trial a key safeguard against state abuse of power has been eroded.
* I am concerned that this trial may be the first of many. If the police can't deal with jury intimidation connected with a robbery; how would they cope if problems occurred in a terrorist trial, there the consequences of a justice not being done, and not being seen to be done, could itself incite more anger and further terrorist acts. I am concerned that what has started today may ultimately make the UK less safe.
Agreed !
The usual security theatre (metal detectors, X-ray machines) etc. greets those entering the Royal Courts of Justice court complex. Staff were fairly relaxed though; the man who entered in front of me said he was carrying a hard disk containing CCTV footage for use in a trial and asked if the X-Ray machine would damage it. Security officers waved the man straight through without looking in his rucksack.
that is a Security FAILURE, which makes a mockery of the public money spent on the X-Ray machine and the "trained" staff !
[...]
.
The judge said that there had been plans, if the press presence had been larger, to allow the press to sit in the jury seats; the journalists responded with a half-gasp, half-laugh. [..]
So this "trial without a jury", very nearly started of as "trial by the press and media" !
The judge then asked the prosecution barrister if there were to be any reporting restrictions. In response the prosecutor referred to restrictions imposed by the court of appeal. The press (and I - though the speech was addressed only to the official press) are forbidden from reporting the names of other defendants who are not being tried in the current trial but are alleged to have been involved in the robbery. One effect of this is to make it harder for people identify any further trial from the court lists if / when it takes place. The former home address of a witness - which is to be mentioned at some point in the trial - can also not be reported.
How exactly is a third party blogger or media organisation not physically present in Court, actually meant to know about these reporting restrictions ?
Prosecutor Simon Russell Flint QC then began; passing what he had trouble not calling the "Jury bundle" to the judge. Aided by illustrations, maps, etc. in the bundle Mr Flint outlined the case; starting with the fact that the events occurred six years ago and described them as a "professionally planned, professionally executed robbery". He listed precise amounts in various currencies which were stolen and then, using a 2004 exchange rate to convert to sterling rather pompously announced the full amount down to the penny.
Will the same misleading claims be made by the prosecution and the media about this being "the biggest" attempted armed robbery in the UK ?
We wrote about this aspect of the reporting of this case, on May 18, 2004:
Heathrow robbery attempt is NOT the biggest in Britain
The infamous Brinks Mat gold bullion robbery in November 1983 netted the criminals £26 million pounds worth of gold bullion - 6800 bars - about 3 tons of gold. This would have been worth over £55 million at today's prices, c.f the Office of National Statistics regarding inflation in the UK since 1750 (.pdf)
The BBC also fails to remind its audience of the largest attempted armed robbery in the UK - the Millennium Dome Diamonds heist - Operation Magician, which attempted to steal over £200 million pounds worth of diamonds.(worth over £213 million at today's prices).
Subsequently, in 2006, the Securitas depot robbery involved over £53million in banknotes.
The "story" of the robbery was then outlined in a painfully slow and repetitive manner, adding little to what has been written about in the press. Interesting elements include: * Heavy reliance by the police on evidence of phone usage (who called who, when and for how long).
* Evidence from "Cell Site" records; was being used to infer "opportunities for meetings" when two phones were near.
* The defendants were alleged to have taken on a plan devised by others. One thing which struck me was that the police were very closely following this group; they had been recording their conversations and knew their target yet they didn't act to prevent the robbery taking place - a robbery in which a gun was fired multiple times and someone could have been seriously injured or killed.
"Evidence from "Cell Site" records; was being used to infer "opportunities for meetings" when two phones were near."
When used as part of a targeted criminal investigation, where the investigators are fully aware of the background details, then this is a useful investigatory technique.
Whether it provides proper evidence, rather than mere suspicion, of a physical meeting
is not all clear, especially if there is no direct voice phone / SMS text or data call record evidence between the alleged participants.
This technique must not be used to speculatively trawl through the billions of retained Communications Traffic Data records of hundreds of millions of innocent European Union citizens, thereby tarring them with "guilt by association" simply for having been in unwitting close proximity with suspected criminals.
The fact that the alleged armed robbers were already under such intensive surveillance by the Police, means that they were collecting and analysing current and perhaps even near real timeCommunications Traffic Data.
This provides no justification whatsoever for mandatory Communications Data Retention of innocent people's data for at least a year.
While in the UK the doors of courts are almost always open there isn't much transparency in the justice system as: It is hard to find out when cases of interest are scheduled. I found out the date and location of this one via a FOI request. As I knew the defendants names I could have watched the official court lists daily and got a few hours notice, but that isn't possible with local magistrates courts.
Court papers are not published online. Had today's "jury bundle"; been published everyone in court (and outside) could have followed along. As the request from the member of the press highlights the full list of charges was neither read out or made available on paper. The Stockwell Inquest and Diana Inquest show how transcripts, evidence and court papers can be effectively published online making the process accessible.
As I understand it - while the taxpayer pays for the recording and transcription of court cases the results are not automatically released to the public;
We agree that Justice is not being seen to be done fairly, because of the secrecy and the internet incompetence of the UK Courts system. |
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Jan. 19, 2017, 5:48 PM GMT / Updated Jan. 19, 2017, 5:47 PM GMT By Paul A. Eisenstein
President-elect Donald Trump's repeated attacks on Mexican auto imports has collapsed the peso — which has ironically made Mexico a more inviting location for American manufacturers.
Trump has repeatedly warned automakers they could be hit with a 35 percent tariff on imports, but some observers believe such threats could actually make it more attractive to invest south of the border.
Donald Trump campaigned on promises to build a wall across the border and slap a tariff on imports from Mexico. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
Several high-level auto industry officials told NBC News that a sharp slump in the price of the peso could more than offset any import tariffs, leading them to consider new Mexican manufacturing options. The unexpected consequence was highlighted by former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers during a speech on Wednesday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
“The decline in the peso is a dagger at Ohio,” said Summers, who served in the Clinton administration from 1999 through 2001. “It is a major change in the relative attractiveness of locating production activity in Mexico versus locating it in the American heartland.”
A Weak Peso Could Offset Trump's 'Border Tax'
Almost from the moment he entered the 2016 president campaign, businessman-turned-politician Donald Trump has criticized the automotive industry for investing in Mexico, a country now among the world’s five largest auto producing nations. Initially, the focus was on Ford which, last April, said it would move its small car production to Mexico. But in recent weeks, the president-elect has also targeted such manufacturers as Toyota, BMW and General Motors.
The threats have wreaked havoc on the Mexican economy. And the peso has collapsed. It is currently trading at nearly 22 to the American dollar, compared to 18 on election day. And that was already down sharply from the beginning of the year, as Mexican trade became an election hot-button issue.
“Compared to when we built our (last) plant in Mexico,” the peso has fallen by almost half,” said a CEO of a major foreign automaker’s U.S. operations. “It makes me think about the opportunity of adding more there,” he said, noting that, “this would probably offset any tariff they might impose.”
Several other senior industry executives with foreign-owned and Detroit-based carmakers said they also need to be considering the economics of Mexican operations, adding that if the peso continues to weaken, the country will retain its economic advantage, especially with reduced labor costs.
That is a case of unintended consequences, former Treasury Secretary Summers added. “And the consequence of that is measured not in the dozens, or hundreds but in the thousands, or ten thousands or even hundreds of thousands of jobs.”
It is another example of “class populism (being) invariably counterproductive for those in whose name it is offered as a policy regime,” he said.
A Trade War Could Be Counterproductive
Summers is by no means the only one worrying that a Trump tariff could be seriously counterproductive. A study released last week by the Center for Automotive Research warned that eliminating or sharply scaling back on NAFTA could seriously impact the U.S. auto industry, especially in the American Midwest, where much of its manufacturing still takes place.
“Counter to the incoming Trump administration’s goal of creating manufacturing jobs, the withdrawal from NAFTA or the implementation of punitive tariffs could result in the loss of 31,000 U.S. jobs,” said a summary of the report by CAR, a highly respected automotive research firm in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Related: Scrubbing NAFTA Could Cost More Than 30,000 U.S. Auto Jobs
“The decline of the peso is not insignificant,” said David Cole, the director-emeritus of that auto think tank, and now the director of an industry-backed effort to increase high-tech training for American manufacturing workers. “You could argue the weakening of the currency could have significant advantages” for Mexico.
Cole and others note that even with the border tariffs threatened by incoming President Trump, automakers are reluctant to leave Mexico. And labor costs are only one factor. America’s southern neighbor not only benefits from NAFTA but from more global free trade agreements than any other country in the world but for Israel.
The Art of the Deal?
As a result, manufacturers can save substantially by using Mexico as a central production base for global distribution. A good example of that is Volkswagen AG’s luxury brand Audi, whose recently opened Mexican plant is now the only source for the wildly popular Q5 sport-utility vehicle.
Even with tariffs, industry analysts like Cole say they cannot envision Audi setting up a new U.S. plant just to provide Americans with those SUVs. And the same goes for other manufacturers.
That was underscored by an announcement Ford made earlier this month. The president-elect sent out congratulatory tweets hailing Ford’s decision to cancel plans for a new, $1.6 billion Mexican assembly plant. But the Detroit maker actually did not reverse its plan to move small car production to Mexico. The Focus model will simply be built in another, existing and underutilized Ford plant in Hermosillo, Joe Hinrichs, Ford’s President of the Americas, told NBC News.
Other Ford insiders agreed that the economics of that move have actually been improving as Mexico’s economy and currency falter.
Despite a series of announcements about new U.S. factory investments in recent weeks, there has been little actual movement of manufacturing back to the U.S. — but for a small axle line by General Motors. Industry insiders say they are highlighting spending plans already in the works as far back as 2014, hoping to curry favor with Trump and gain some leverage in negotiations over cross-border trade. But Mary Barra, the GM CEO and Chairman, said last week at the North American International Auto Show that the carmaker doesn’t plan to alter its global manufacturing plans just to please the new president.
Not everyone is taking that position, however. In an interview with the Associated Press this week, Nissan Motor Company CEO Carlos Ghosn, said, "All the carmakers have listened to [Trump's] message and will act in consequence.”
If and how Nissan will respond remains to be seen, however. The carmaker already produces the majority of vehicles it sells in the U.S. in two American plants. The one in Smyrna, Tennessee is, in fact, the largest single assembly line in the country.
Related: GM’s $1B Investment Is Not Driven by Trump and Likely Dates Back to 2014
But Nissan also has major factories in Mexico, including a relatively new complex in Aguascalientes where it just opened a new line that will be the sole source of some of its small Infiniti luxury models. Alliance partner Mercedes-Benz was set to share that plant for some of its own models that would be shipped worldwide.
Changing those plans just to satisfy the new president seems questionable, said David Andrea, a long-time, Michigan-based automotive analyst, especially when it comes to Mexican-made products that will be shipped worldwide.
“He’s collapsed the peso,” Andrea said of Trump, “and you can buy a hell of a lot more now out of Mexico,” even with a border tariff. |
On December 20, 2017, Republicans passed the GOP Tax Scam. And in doing so, they demonstrated that they only care about power and the short-term enrichment of themselves and their wealthy donors—not their constituents, democratic institutions, or even objective reality.
The Trump Tax Scam is a huge giveaway to the wealthy and corporations, paid for by the rest of us. Republicans admit they don’t know what’s in this bill. They admit they don’t know how it came together. They admit they don’t know how it will impact the economy. But their donors gave them a job to do, and they did it.
Every single Member of Congress needs to hear from you, and know that this vote will define the rest of their career.
For Democrats
They need to hear that this tax code should only last until we have control of Congress again. Tell them that, when we retake the House and Senate again, we need to design a tax code that puts working- and middle-class families first—not the donor class and corporations. |
JENNY MCCARTHY, a celebrity who introduced herself to the world on the pages of Playboy 20 years ago, is the proud owner of a Pigasus award, bestowed every April Fool’s day on “the performer who fooled the greatest number of people using the least talent”. Ms McCarthy, an anti-vaccination campaigner, says she is not opposed to vaccination. But she has defended debunked claims that jabs can trigger autism, and reckons her son was cured of his autism through vitamins and diet. More recently the anti-vaccination cause has been taken up by Alicia Silverstone, an actress whose name may now forever be linked to “Clueless” (pictured), a 1995 update of Jane Austen’s Emma in which she starred.
Whooping cough (pertussis), a contagious bacterial infection that is deeply unpleasant for adults and can be fatal for small children, was supposed to have been largely eradicated from the United States, thanks to widespread vaccination. Infections fell from 222,202 in 1941 to 1,010 in 1976. But lately it has made an unwelcome return. In 2012 48,277 cases were reported, the highest figure in over half a century. On June 13th California declared an epidemic; 3,458 cases, including two deaths, have been reported so far this year. Other parts of the country, including Tennessee and Alabama, have also seen big rises, and there has been a worrying climb in measles cases.
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Ms McCarthy and her ill-informed followers bear only part of the blame. At least as important is the phasing-out, in the 1990s, of an old vaccine which had nasty side-effects. The immunity conferred by the replacement appears to wear off sooner; health officials urge older children and adults to take a booster jab, but few do. Still, kooky anti-vaccination fears appear to be doing real harm. A study of a 2010 whooping-cough epidemic in California, in which ten babies died, found that areas where many people refused to vaccinate their kids were 2.5 times likelier to have high incidences of whooping cough. No such study has been conducted on this year’s outbreak, although the wealthy coastal enclaves of Marin, Napa and Sonoma counties are among the hardest-hit.
Listening to the ideas of Californian celebrities has not always been bad for Americans, as Ronald Reagan demonstrated. But when it comes to vaccination, probably best to leave it to the experts. |
Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings.
Feb. 14, 2016, 1:54 AM GMT / Updated Feb. 14, 2016, 8:23 AM GMT By Phil Helsel
President Barack Obama said he will nominate a successor to replace Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, answering Republicans who called for him to leave the decision to the next president.
Obama paid tribute to Scalia in remarks Saturday night following the jurist's unexpected death earlier in the day, calling him "one of the towering legal figures of our time” and a "larger-than-life presence on the bench."
"A brilliant legal mind with an energetic style, an incisive wit and colorful opinions, he influenced a generation of judges, lawyers and students, and profoundly shaped the legal landscape,” Obama said. "He will no doubt be remembered as one of the most consequential judges and thinkers to serve on the Supreme Court."
While the president said Saturday was "a time to remember Justice Scalia's legacy," he did announce his intention to nominate a successor.
The Republican Senate majority leader and chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee called for the decision to be delayed and left to the next president.
Obama rebuffed the suggestion, saying "these are responsibilities that I take seriously as should everyone” that are "bigger than any one party.”
“They are about our democracy, and they are about the institution to which Justice Scalia dedicated his professional life in making sure it continues to function as the beacon of justice that our Founders envisioned,” Obama said.
Related: There's a Supreme Court Vacancy. What Happens Next?
He made clear there is “plenty of time” left in his term to nominate the next justice and for the Senate to hold hearings and confirm the pick.
Scalia was the court’s most influential conservative. He was nominated in 1986 by President Ronald Reagan, and was confirmed unanimously.
Famous for his strong language and fiery dissents, Scalia authored the ruling said the Second Amendment guarantees an individual's right to own a firearm, the court's most important gun case ever.
Republican presidential candidates Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio said Saturday that the next president should choose Scalia’s successor. Ben Carson called on the Senate to block any Obama nominee.
While Obama made clear he planned to move ahead with a nomination, he also said that was a decision for another day because "at this moment, we most of all want to think about" Scalia's family.
“Michelle and I join the nation in sending our deepest sympathies to Justice Scalia’s wife Maureen and their loving family, a beautiful symbol of a life well lived," Obama said. "We thank them for sharing Justice Scalia with our country." |
CTV Vancouver
A high-risk sex offender and person of interest in a recent assault of an elderly woman has been arrested on UBC campus, Vancouver police confirmed.
The attack occurred in the area of West 45th Avenue and Cambie Street in Oakridge, shortly before 10 p.m. on Thursday.
Vancouver police said an 86-year-old woman was dropped off at her home, walked to the rear of the building and entered. As she began to turn off the alarm system, a man approached her from behind and tried to force his way inside.
The alarm went off as the woman struggled, and the suspect ran away.
The senior was injured and had to be taken to hospital for treatment of a broken hand.
Jason Anthony White, a 45-year-old high-risk sex offender wanted Canada-wide, is considered a person of interest in the Oakridge assault.
Police say he was arrested at around 3:30 a.m. Saturday on the University of British Columbia campus but it's unclear why he was there.
Just hours earlier, thousands of students had attended a year-end block party on campus.
Const. Brian Montague says police did a preliminary search when he was arrested and brought a search and canvass team to the site later Saturday to do a more thorough job.
“Why he was at UBC will be part of the ongoing investigation,” he said in an email. “We will be having a close look at White's activity over the past few days, weeks and months.
“We will also continue to liaise and work with other jurisdictions to share any information that may assist them.”
The university's RCMP detachment did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The campus has seen a series of “night prowler” events where a man was seen lurking in bathrooms and bedrooms at UBC residences, and a sexual assault of a 20-year-old woman last month.
The description of the suspect in those incidents was of a man in his mid to late 20s with dark skin.
White, who also goes by the name of Jason Eugene Rindero, is a convicted high-risk sex offender and was serving a federal sentence.
Court documents show White has a lengthy criminal history, dating back decades.
He was convicted of more than 20 crimes as an adult, including a violent sexual assault and robbery of a 74-year-old woman in Nanaimo in February 1994.
White was deemed a dangerous offender for the assault, but eventually appealed it and was released on a long-term supervision order.
A Canada-wide warrant was issued after White breached the order.
With files from The Canadian Press |
A teenager who smashed his way out of a burning Hamilton house which claimed three lives yesterday says he yelled to friends before leaping from the second storey to escape the ferocious blaze.
House destroyed by fire in Hamilton.
Seventeen-year-old Baylay Reid doesn't live at the property but had been staying there when he was woken by yelling and screaming.
Mourners gather near the site where three people lost their lives in a house fire yesterday. Source: 1 NEWS
He told ONE News that he had to smash a window to escape from the deadly fire.
Police are yet to confirm the identity of those who lost their lives in the fire, but hundreds of people have taken to social media to pay tribute to 19-year-old Jake Hayes and 17-year-old Connor Swetman.
Friends say that it was Jake's first night in the house and the party held before the fire broke out was to welcome him to the property.
Toni Maree Johnston is also presumed dead.
Forty five firefighters were called to the blaze in Collingwood Street yesterday morning.
Friends described Connor to ONE News as "cheeky" and "outgoing".
Samantha Krippner and Courtney Sarjeant say they spoke to Connor's family yesterday but they were devastated and too distraught to say much. |
There were 3 times more bumper deaths reported in the last 7 years than the 3 previous time periods (χ2 (3) = 13.5, P ≤ .01). This could be attributable to increased reporting by the states, diagnostic shift, or both, or possibly a true increase in deaths. Bumpers caused 48 suffocations, 67% by a bumper alone, not clutter, and 33% by wedgings between a bumper and another object. The number of CPSC-reported deaths was compared with those from the National Center for the Review and Prevention of Child Deaths, 2008-2011; the latter reported substantially more deaths than CPSC, increasing the total to 77 deaths. Injury mechanisms showed significant differences by age (F 4,120 = 3.2, P < .001) and were caused by design, construction, and quality control problems. Eleven injuries were apparent life-threatening events. |
By , 10
The iCE40 FPGA family from Lattice Semiconductor comprises ultra-low-density (ULD) devices whose low-cost, small footprint, and extremely small power consumption makes them ideal for a tremendous range of handheld and battery-powered applications.
Applications for ultra-low-density devices include timing-critical high-end remote controls and point of sale (POS) scan guns and data terminals, I/O expansion tasks for space-limited systems (e.g., servers, storage, and communications), hardware acceleration for factory automation, image pre-processing, and displays (e.g., rotation and scaling), and bridging functions (e.g., video interfacing, processor glue logic, and image sensor bridges).
Now, Lattice has introduced the iCEstick Evaluation Kit. Boasting a "bargain basement" price of only $24.99, the iCEstick allows users to quickly and easily familiarize themselves with the capabilities of iCE40 FPGAs and facilitates the rapid prototyping of system functions.
The iCEstick is a USB thumb-drive form-factor evaluation board that is powered by, and programmed via, a standard USB port. One thing I personally like is the fact that as soon as you plug the iCEstick into a USB port, its default program causes the LEDs to start flashing in a circular fashion. In addition to providing instant feedback that everything is working as expected, who amongst us can deny the power of flashing LEDs? (Show me a flashing LED, and I'll show you a man entranced with delight.)
The iCE40 FPGAs are unusual in that they are SRAM-based, which allows them to be reprogrammed on the fly and/or loaded from an external device like an SPI Flash or a microcontroller. (Once again, everything about these devices -- including the SRAM configuration cells -- has been highly optimized to use the least possible amount of power.) However, they also boast one-time programmable (OTP) non-volatile configuration capability, which allows them to be pre-programmed and to run "instant-on" without requiring external configuration. For the purposes of this evaluation board, the vast majority of users will employ the on-board SPI Flash memory to store the configuration as illustrated below:
The USB chip is used to download new configurations from the host computer, and also to provide bidirectional communications with the host computer as discussed below. The iCE40 FPGA on the iCEstick boasts 1,280 x 4-input lookup tables (LUTs) of user-programmable fabric along with 64Kb of embedded RAM and a PLL, all of which allows you to implement a surprising amount of functionality.
Five on-board LEDs can be used to display all sorts of different information, plus the user has access to 16 general-purpose input/output (GPIO) pins. Of particular interest is the Pmod connector, which allows users to connect a wide variety of external sensors and actuators, ranging from microphones with digital interfaces to accelerometers to GPS receivers. (Click here to see the Pmod offerings from Digilent; other vendors like Analog Devices and Maxim also offer Pmod modules.)
Last but certainly not least, the iCEstick includes an IrDA (Infrared Data Association) transceiver. IrDA protocols are implemented in a range of portable devices, including mobile phones, laptops, cameras, printers, medical devices, and many more.
Of particular interest is that fact that the iCEstick is supported by a range of reference design demonstrations, each of which can form the starting point for the user's own design. In the case of the accelerometer demo, for example, a 3-axis accelerometer module is plugged into the Pmod connector. As the accelerometer is moved, the iCEstick's LEDs will indicate the direction of motion (north, south, east, and west).
In the case of the IrDA TX demo, the user opens a HyperTerminal window on the host computer. Now, whatever is typed on the keyboard will be transmitted via the IrDA and also echoed in uppercase characters in the HyperTerminal window. Taking things one step further, two iCEsticks can be used together (either plugged into two USB ports on the same computer or -- more usually -- plugged into USB ports on different computers). One iCEstick can be configured to be the transmitter and the other to be the receiver. Now, whatever is typed in the HyperTerminal window associated with the transmitting iCEstick will be displayed in the HyperTerminal window associated with the receiving iCEstick.
All in all, I think the iCEstick Evaluation Kit is amazing value for the price and -- in conjunction with the wide variety of Pmod sensors and actuators that are available -- it opens the door to some very interesting design evaluations and product prototyping scenarios. (Click here for more information.)
Related posts: |
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2008 November 6
A Sharper View of a Hazy Giant
Credit: ESO, F.Marchis, M.Wong (UC Berkeley); E.Marchetti, P.Amico, S.Tordo (ESO)
Explanation: This dramatic image of Jupiter is touted as the sharpest picture of the entire gas giant ever taken from the ground. The picture was made using a prototype instrument known as MAD (Multi-conjugate Adaptive optics Demonstrator) mounted on one of the European Southern Observatory's 8-meter diameter Very Large Telescope units in Chile. Working at infrared wavelengths the MAD instrument removes atmospheric blurring, the bane of earthbound telescopes, by using multiple guide stars and deformable mirrors to sense and correct for the distortions produced by turbulence in Earth's atmosphere. Hydrogen and methane deep in Jupiter's own thick atmosphere absorb light at infrared wavelengths. So, this sharper view shows the infrared sunlight reflected from the giant planet's high level haze prominent in the equatorial regions and near the poles. It reveals features as small as 300 kilometers across. The promising technique can also be applied to imaging other extended objects like star clusters and nebulae.
Take a survey on Aesthetics and Astronomy. |
Microsoft Space Simulator is a space flight simulator program, based on Microsoft Flight Simulator for MS-DOS. It was one of the first general-purpose space flight simulators and it incorporated concepts from astrodynamics and celestial mechanics.
Development [ edit ]
Microsoft Space Simulator was released by Microsoft Home in 1994. It was developed by BAO Ltd., a company run by Bruce Artwick who was also behind development of Microsoft Flight Simulator) with Charles Guy as lead developer.
It provided support for 256 color graphics on three resolutions: 320x400, 640x400, 800x600. The graphics featured dithered gouraud shading 3D vessels, with texture mapped planets, moons, and deep sky objects.[2]
Physics engine [ edit ]
Microsoft Space Simulator uses Newton's laws of motion but takes account of relativistic effects by decreasing a spacecraft's acceleration as its speed approaches the speed of light[3]. It does not take account of time dilation.
Atmospheric effect are not modeled and all planetary surfaces are treated as flat spheres. A limited collision detection between vessels is implemented by using docking ports.
Features [ edit ]
The simulator featured 14 different spacecraft, most of them futuristic. Historical or current tech craft include the Space Shuttle (with its Manned Maneuvering Unit) and Apollo Command/Service Module and Lunar Module.
Reception [ edit ]
PC Gamer gave the simulator a score of 84% in its March 1995 issue[4].
See also [ edit ] |
(Robinson Air Force Base May 2014/Facebook)Military personnel at Robins Air Force Base were banned from using the greeting "Have a blessed day" after complaints from the Military Religious Freedom Foundation.
WARNER ROBINS, Ga. (Christian Examiner) -- Military personnel at Georgia's Robins Air Force Base received instruction to stop imparting the greeting "have a blessed day" Monday.
According to the anti-Christian Military Religious Freedom Foundation website, an active duty Air Force member contacted the organization for assistance claiming the greeting was an issue of separation of church and state.
The unnamed military member, who claimed revealing his identity would result in endangering himself and his family, said he received the greeting at one of the base gates since Feb. 23 "by at least 10 different Airmen ranging in rank."
"On no less than 15 occasions over the last two weeks, I have been greeted by the military personnel at the gate with the phrase 'Have a blessed day,'" the complaint read.
The statement added the greeting was unwelcome due to the serviceman's "non-religious" nature.
"I found the greeting to be a notion that I, as a non-religious member of the military community should believe a higher power has an influence on how my day should go."
The morning of the complaint, Mikey Weinstein, MMRF founder and president, contacted the unit commander for base security forces.
On his website, Weinstein said the officer who responded was extremely compliant.
The major reportedly asked if he could resolve the issue simply by instructing his gate guards to "stop saying that sectarian 'greeting' and replaced it with 'have a nice day.'" Weinstein said he gave his assent, and, a follow up note from the unnamed complainer confirmed the new greeting was implemented.
"The personnel at the gates have immediately changed their greetings to a more professional "Have a nice/good day sir/maam." The anonymous atheist added it was "unfortunate" that MRFF should be "necessary in this day and age" to "stand and yell 'This isn't right'" on behalf of non-religious service members who feel discriminated against. |
Civility (Even when it’s hard): Keeping Scientific Bitcoin Debates Scientific
Bruce Fenton Blocked Unblock Follow Following Mar 24, 2017
Spoiler alert: Iron Man and Captain America still worked together as allies despite their Civil War.
Two years ago as Satoshi Roundtable II took shape a few of us had a naive grand vision that with pretty much everyone in the room we’d lock the doors and stay until we hammered out an agreement that all in the Bitcoin capacity discussion would be happy with. This naïveté was a key mistake for that event. For Satoshi Roundtable III, having learned our lesson, the approach was far more relaxed without even a hope of an agreement…just a hope that constructive dialogue continues.
As this current discussion has become more heated, more high stakes and more emotional, bridges have caught fire…but they have not all burned down just yet. It’s true, many of those involved in Bitcoin are moving further apart by the day. Some feel that others have bad intentions or are even outright liars. This is a sad side effect of any complex debate. With enough discussion of a complex and contentious issue even the most well-meaning person can go off the rails with unproductive statements. With sufficiently complex issues it’s increasingly easy to accuse one side of “lying” when statements could be just as easily attributed to differences in opinion combined with wording or even misunderstanding.
The battle lines are so solid now that no one is going to sit in a circle and sing Kumbaya with the other side. But we can nevertheless remain civil and scientific. As much as it might sound like a corny self-help seminar, there can be great value in people in varying positions thinking about the good qualities and human side of their opponents. Bitcoiners on polar opposite sides of this discussion have more in common with each other than 99% of the world. The number of people worldwide who can even understand what the debate is about is so small it can’t be statistically represented. There are probably more people globally who believe Bitcoin should be flat out outlawed than everyone on both sides of the capacity debate. Focusing on what we agree on is productive.
I’m lucky to be in a unique position for two reasons: 1) I personally know, like and respect a lot of people of differing opinions about this issue 2) I don’t have a strong technical bias and prefer any solution which mends bridges over a single particular technical stance. These two factors have provided the reward of being able to see both sides as well as to discount most attacks.
Roger Ver is not a villain trying to destroy Bitcoin, he cares deeply about the technology to the point that you can see the emotion in his eyes when he talks about it. He worked very hard for a long time to reach a mutually beneficial agreement and only moved to BU when he felt all other options were exhausted. Roger has a rebel and activist streak and while some debate whether he is doing the right thing, no one should be surprised that if he thinks he’s doing the right thing that he’d fight so fiercely.
Adam Back, likewise, is not a banker shill trying to use Blockstream to control Bitcoin. He’s a highly accomplished computer scientist and cryptographer who also cares deeply about this tech. If he’s a sleeper agent for Big Brother he would have had to invest 30 years into doing so, his extremely long history of support for decentralization and security is unimpeachable. He’s also spent countless hours speaking to dozens if not hundreds of people to explain his views on risk and security.
One could go on like this about many major figures in this discussion. If you think on it, it’s not so hard to see the other side and have some empathy. We have world class coders like Wladimir and Pieter who work magic with code but just don’t like the game of playing politics and having debates in the public eye. They’d rather keep their head down and code. Now this can be a drawback for issues of accountability or discussion but who can blame them? It’s no more fair to criticize devs for lack of public argument than it is to criticize someone who’s great with human relations for not being a world class coder.
We are still in the very early days of this technology. While now big money and Wall Street have begun dabbling, this industry is still in its infancy. We are, all of us, BU supporters, core devs, CEOs, users, holders and VCs, to some degree oddball geek early adopters of a very niche experiment. Our similarities are massive.
My favorite part of not just the Satoshi Roundtable but this industry as a whole is when leading figures in this space from different backgrounds and parts of the world sit for hours and discuss the deep meaning this technology has for them and the thrilling future we all look forward to seeing. It’s also great when the topic drifts from ‘shop talk’ to politics, gaming, VR, drones, hacking, driverless cars, religion or AI. Bitcoin has an inordinate amount of gamers, martial artists and Magic the Gathering players. We’ve got game programmers and world travelers, Burning Man regulars and amateur DJs. The other day I learned that super developer Matt Corallo is also an expert coffee maker. It’s really the most wonderful and fascinating group of people I’ve ever met. The same quirky personality traits which helped bring us to this crazy world of digital geek money also brought us to similar views on philosophy and politics as well as similar tastes in hobbies, books and movies. Part of that beauty is that we are not monolithic: socialist leaning Jeremy Gardner can wade into a sea of rabid anarchists and libertarians and have a vigorous debate characterized by mutual respect and smart people can disagree on anything from Ethereum’s governance to regulations on self driving cars.
The discussion is too serious to for everyone to put aside their differences and have some coffee while discussing martial arts or a video game…but maybe remembering the human side of the others in the discussion can help improve some civility. As with all discussion, avoiding petty personal attacks, unproductive tactics and logical fallacies is a huge plus. It’s hard and the stakes are higher than they’ve ever been.
Maybe you are Captain America, maybe you are Iron Man. More importantly is that maybe, just maybe, when this whole phase is over everyone will be able to again focus on the common ground that all sides in this discussion share. It’s worth it. |
Female comic heroes featured in breast cancer detection ads
A new ad campaign in Mozambique by Associação da Luta Contra o Cancer (ALCC) is using Wonder Woman, Catwoman, She-Hulk and Storm to promote self-examinations for breast cancer prevention.
The ad copy states:
Nobody’s immune to breast cancer. When we talk about breast cancer there are no women or super women. Everybody has to do self-examination monthly. Fight with us against the enemy and, when in doubt, talk to you doctor.
The images are quite striking. The faces of the characters are only partially seen, but the characters are easy identifiable. And while we often see women feeling or touching their breasts n comics, the art here is not sexual or exploitative and has almost a solemn feel to it.
I’d like to see these ads in other counties; it’s a very compelling concept.
Update: Here’s a link to the artist’s DA page.
Wonder Woman and others after the cut.
(Source: osocio.org) |
The finding that one in five women are sexually assaulted in college is as widely known as it is startling. Countless media reports repeat and recycle the alarming statistic, and it headlined the initial report introduced by Vice President Biden from the White House Task Force to Protect Students from Campus Assault.
But how trustworthy is that figure of one in five? An earlier poll found it was more like 1 in 40, but should it matter whether the real number is closer to the high or low end of the scale?
“We know there are rapists on campus that target vulnerable women,” says Christina Hoff Sommers, a resident scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, who thinks getting the numbers right is important. “Inflated figures lead to ineffective policies and breed panic and over-reach.”
Sommers makes a good case that the one-in-five finding is inflated, and that the administration and the media have been careless in disseminating it as fact. It comes from a 2007 study conducted by the Justice Department’s National Institute of Justice, a web-based survey of two large public universities, one in the Midwest, and one in the South. Female undergraduates aged 18 to 25 took part in the anonymous random sample, and each received a $10 certificate to Amazon for participating.
Web surveys are automatically suspect, and the response rate was less than half, 42 percent, “which is miserable,” says Sommers. The researchers themselves cautioned against over-generalizing from the 5,446 respondents to the entire country’s college population, and Sommers cites the danger of selection bias, where people who feel most strongly respond.
“I always like to know what did they ask,” she says, reserving her strongest criticism for the expansive definition of sexual assault that is now part of the lexicon, particularly factoring in the role of alcohol. She notes that in some 70 percent of assaults categorized in the poll, alcohol was involved, and the woman was incapacitated.
“If sexual intimacy under the influence is by definition assault, sexual relations down through the ages would be classified as an assault,” says Sommers, a former professor of philosophy who has made a name for herself as an outspoken critic of contemporary feminism. “What might be dismissed as a foolish drunken hookup is now a felony rape.”
Since the White House report, titled “Not Alone,” was released in late April, lawmakers have looked for ways to curb what appears to be the soaring number of sexual assaults on college campuses. Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill, a former prosecutor of sex crimes, will introduce bipartisan legislation in the next few weeks that Sommers and other critics worry will further confuse and blur the lines around what might once have been dismissed as a sexual misunderstanding, with the burden of proof shifting significantly from the woman to the accused.
The details of what McCaskill will propose are not yet fully known, but the expectation is that the legislation will call for consent every step of the way in a sexual encounter. The consent doesn’t have to be verbal. It can be implicit and it can be body language, but it must be clear and unambiguous.
Stuart Taylor Jr., a lawyer and a journalist, joined Sommers on a recent panel at the conservative Independent Women’s Forum to decry what he called “the pressure to treat all drunken sex as rape.” He said that Department of Education rules have changed during the Obama administration from convincing evidence to preponderance of evidence in assessing guilt.
“Preponderance means 51 percent sure and 49 percent not, you find him guilty,” he said, calling it “a degrading of due process for males who may have been wrongly accused.”
Taylor said he could imagine young men today tape-recording permission at every stage. “Do I exaggerate?” he asked, conceding “perhaps,” then adding when it’s his word against hers, unless it’s on tape, there’s an incentive to document your case against what he called “de facto extreme feminist presumption of guilt.”
Taylor’s prediction of what lies ahead is supported by a comment made to The Washington Post by George Washington University Law School professor John F. Banzhaf III, who said he is seeing more cases of young men using video of sexual encounters to defend themselves against assault or rape.
A recent column by conservative columnist George Will said progressive policies expanding the definition of rape “make victimhood a coveted status that confers privileges,” and when that happens, “victims proliferate.” Will’s observations seemed to trivialize the very real problem of rape and assault on college campuses, and he ran into a buzz saw of criticism from women’s groups that resulted in at least one newspaper canceling his column. Asked about Will’s column, Taylor said its flaw was in the tone, which implied that campus assault was not a big problem, but rather a privilege to be a victim. Taylor said that being perceived as a victim was the distinction that Will failed to make.
Unlike most legislation in Congress, the effort to clarify and modernize the federal guidelines around how to handle sexual assault on campuses is a bipartisan effort, perhaps because members of both parties have daughters. Sommers has legitimate questions about the slippery slope of government getting involved, but any argument that appears to minimize the problem will get slapped down by those who know better, and rightly so. |
Something Called The Worst Movie Ever! Made $11 Last Weekend
Last weekend was an especially brutal one for new releases, with Fright Night, Conan the Barbarian and Spy Kids: All the Time in the World all performing well below expectations. But numerous indies and other limited releases had it even worse: Renny Harlin's 5 Days of War grossed less than $7,000 on two screens. The Patrick Dempsey/Ashley Judd heist romcom Flypaper barely broke $1,000 in a pair of theaters. But something called The Worst Movie Ever! had arguably the worst movie opening ever: $11.
According to Box Office Mojo, the film debuted on one screen and appears to have had one single viewer. A scan of the film's Facebook page reveals that screen to have been at the Laemmle Sunset 5 in Los Angeles, where WME! had two midnight screenings on Friday and Saturday -- only one of which was actually attended by anybody, evidently. "I just received the box office numbers from LA - ugh," wrote writer-producer-director-star Glenn Berggoetz in a post on Monday. His viewer's identity isn't clear, but signs point to young co-star Christine Mascolo, who had her photograph snapped in front of the theater over the weekend. (Berggoetz, who is based in Denver, has not yet responded to Movieline's request for comment.) The resulting $11 gross rivals the infamous $20 earned by the Katherine Heigl bomb Zzyax Road, which screened to exactly six people over a week in 2007.
So what exactly is The Worst Movie Ever!? Let's start with the trailer:
Huh. At least it made its money back, I guess.
Worst Movie Ever!'s IMDB synopsis adds a little more coarse perspective: "A robot alien. Angst-ridden teens. Cleavage-wielding soul takers. A dark overlord. A cross-dressing retard. A pregnant 14-year-old cougar. Macho scientists. Santa Claus. Yeah, this movie has it all." In an interview in June with a newspaper in Fort Wayne, Ind. (where native son Berggoetz was screening his action spoof To Die Is Hard), the filmmaker elaborated further:
The Worst Movie EVER! is a little bit harder to summarize. ... Boltar the robot alien is sent down to Earth to destroy. He decides to wreak havoc on a particular neighborhood. In this neighborhood are two angry teenagers (played by two actors with a combined age of 108 years at the time of the shoot); one of the teen's mentally challenged identical twin brother; a 14-year old cougar and her 10-year old boyfriend, who has gotten her pregnant; a cleavage-wielding soul-taker who is determined to steal the soul of the mentally challenged teen; and two geeky scientists who try to turn macho and kill Boltar to save the day.
Yes, the plot is a complete mess, which is part of the point of the film being awful. Maybe the tagline will help: "It may be the worst movie ever, but it's the best sci-fi/action/drama/horror/musical you've ever seen."
Maybe! Only one person in Los Angeles knows for sure. Meanwhile, the Alamo Drafthouse in Winchester, Va., has booked Worst Movie Ever! to screen next Wednesday, Aug. 31, at 11:10 p.m. "If you're anywhere close to the area (it's about an hour west of Washington, DC), please attend!" wrote Berggoetz today in another Facebook post. Indeed, please do! You know where to send your reactions afterward. |
Jennifer Lawrence has broken her silence over her stolen nude photos that were leaked online this summer, telling Vanity Fair in an interview excerpt published Tuesday the hack was “not a scandal. It is a sex crime.”
In the November cover story, Lawrence recalled trying to address the leak—which affected more than 100 celebrities—but “every single thing that I tried to write made me cry or get angry. I started to write an apology, but I don’t have anything to say I’m sorry for. I was in a loving, healthy, great relationship for four years. It was long distance, and either your boyfriend is going to look at porn or he’s going to look at you.”
Lawrence also strongly condemned those who perpetuated the violation against her privacy.
“Anybody who looked at those pictures, you’re perpetuating a sexual offense,” she said. “You should cower with shame. Even people who I know and love say, ‘Oh, yeah, I looked at the pictures.’ I don’t want to get mad, but at the same time I’m thinking, ‘I didn’t tell you that you could look at my naked body.’”
But even as the actress told the emotional story of telling her father what happened—”I don’t care how much money I get for The Hunger Games, I promise you, anybody given the choice of that kind of money or having to make a phone call to tell your dad that something like that has happened, it’s not worth it”—she maintained her signature humor.
“Fortunately, he was playing golf, so he was in a good mood.”
The 3,000 word piece will be available in Vanity Fair’s digital edition on Oct. 9, then on newsstands nationwide Oct. 14.
Here's What 20 Famous Women Think About Feminism D Dipasupil—Getty Images for Extra Loic Venance—AFP/Getty Images Anthony Harvey—Getty Images Joe Scarnici—Getty Images Jason Kempin—Getty Images Christopher Polk—Getty Images D Dipasupil—FilmMagic Dave Kotinsky—Getty Images (Tabatha Fireman—Redferns/Getty Images) Christopher Polk—NBC/Getty Images Jason Kempin—Getty Images Mandel Ngan—AFP/Getty Images Jason Kempin—NBC/Getty Images Myrna Suarez—WireImage Julio Cesar Aguilar—AFP/Getty Images Isaac Brekken—Getty Images Michael Buckner—Getty Images Dave J Hogan—Getty Images Kevin Mazur—WireImage Traverso—L'Oreal/Getty Images Alex Goodlett—Getty Images 1 of 21 Advertisement
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For all the talk this past week about Mitt Romney's latest gems -- his "I like being able to fire people who provide services to me" line and his "There were a couple of times I wondered whether I was going to get a pink slip" -- I'm surprised more people haven't reckoned with the fact that they were quite inconsistent statements. One was meant to express empathy with economically distressed voters, one was meant to reflect a business-minded toughness and clarity. They were spoken within a day of one another. So what gives? Well, here's what many are missing in trying to make sense of why Romney says these sorts of things. It's all about the context.
No, not just the context of what he meant to say when he said them (the "I like being able to fire people" line was said in regards to health insurance choice.) I mean the context in which he says things -- that is, the place and audience he is speaking to. After observing Romney on the trail, it's become clear to me that he is someone who is acutely aware of the sort of people he is speaking to, and that he often tries too hard in trying to reach what he imagines is the id of that group.
The best candidates, of course, are those who are able to pick up on the vibe of the audience and tailor the tone and content of their remarks accordingly. With Romney, the tailoring is far more crude and obvious. Some of it is relatively innocuous, if wince-inducing -- in Iowa, the lines of "America the Beautiful" that he quotes are the ones about "amber waves of grain," while in New Hampshire it's "purple mountains majesty." But occasionally, the imperative to meet the imagined sweet spot of his audience produces the lines that make unfortunate headlines and fodder for fun video compilations by his rivals. It is no accident that the "pink slip" line came when Romney was speaking to voters in Rochester, N.H., what he knows from his ample time spent in the state to be one of the cluster of struggling former milltowns clustered in the Seacoast region near the Maine line. The irony, of course, is that the crowd that he drew to the town Opera House was, from all appearances, more upscale than the one that Rick Santorum drew the next day in nearby Somerworth. But data-driven Romney knew that he was in hard-luck country, and so out popped the empathy line, comically overdone.
And where was he when he made his "I like being able to fire people" remarks? Speaking before the Greater Nashua Chamber of Commerce. The Romney campaign has been open about the fact that it is trying extra hard to reach out to local businessmen -- the insurance guys and small-town bankers who belong to the Rotary and the local Chamber, types that Romney sees as his natural constituency. Even when he's in front of a general audience on the trail, he'll often ask whether there are any businesspeople in the room. So there he is at the Nashua Chamber, wearing a blazer and dress shirt as opposed to the jeans and plaid that he had the day before in Rochester, and he starts to wax businessman. The inexplicably poorly worded line makes slightly more sense if it's seen as an attempt to build camaraderie, confidence, with the guys in blazers arrayed in front of him. In Mitt's mind, this was locker-room talk, Chamber-style: "Hey, don't you guys kind of get off on being able to cut off a lousy supplier or a service provider? Kind of a little kick, delivering the justice of the free market on your very own?" |
After its social properties were compromised, Microsoft today indicated that a “small number” of its employee’s Outlook accounts were hacked by the Syrian Electronic Army as well. The online group had previously tweeted out screenshots of emails purportedly from Microsoft staffers.
As The Verge notes, those published screenshots “mainly discuss[ed] the latest compromises of several Microsoft-owned Twitter accounts.” Included among the published screenshots was an email from Steve Clayton to Frank Shaw. Luckily for the two their disclosed dialogue was pedestrian.
It is unclear the extent of the security breach, and if emails were taken from the accounts or in other ways stored that could prove embarrassing for Microsoft. To have your social accounts’ security snapped is par for the course in our current age. To have your email systems broken into is another game, especially if you are the company that built the system, and if you’re selling it to companies around the world.
Microsoft provided a statement to The Verge stating that a “social engineering cyberattack method known as phishing resulted in a small number of Microsoft employee social media and email accounts being impacted” in the incident. The accounts in question have been “reset” according to the company. No customer information was compromised, it claims.
That’s fine, but what the SEA could have found inside the inboxes of key Microsoft employees could be damaging, or embarrassing, or both. That’s not to say that the employees in question are more salacious than average, but more that we all speak more freely when in private than public.
If the SEA delved during its incursion, it might have uncovered a number of internal plans and methods. Should those leak to the media, Microsoft could lose control of its own news cycles for some time to come.
Top Image Credit: Flickr |
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky was born October 30, 1821, in Moscow's Hospital for the Poor. He was the second of seven children born to a former army surgeon, who was murdered in 1839 when his own serfs poured vodka down his throat until he died.
Following a boarding school education in Moscow with his older brother Mikhail, Fyodor was admitted to the Academy of Military Engineers in St. Petersburg in 1838. He completed his studies in 1843, graduating as a lieutenant, but was quickly convinced that he preferred a career in writing to being mired in the bureaucratic Russian military. In 1844 he published a translation of Balzac's Eugenie Grandet, and he followed this two years later with his first original published work, Poor Folk, a widely-acclaimed short novel championed by the influential critic Vissarion Belinsky.
His works over the next three years were not as well accepted. The "literary lights" whose acquaintance he had made started to treat him with contempt and mockery. Under the influence of Belinsky, Dostoevsky turned to a materialist atheism. In 1847, he broke with Belinsky's group to join the socialist Petrashevsky group, a secret society of liberal utopians, where he associated himself with the most radical element.
On April 23, 1849, Dostoevsky was arrested with other members of the Petrashevsky circle and was sentenced to death. He was placed in solitary confinement in the Petropavlovsky Fortress for eight months. During this time, Tsar Nikolai I changed his sentence but ordered that this change only be announced at the last minute. On December 22, Dostoevsky and his fellow prisoners were led through all the initial steps of execution, and several of them were already tied to posts awaiting their deaths when the reprieve was sounded.
Dostoevsky's sentence of eight years' hard labor in a Siberian prison was reduced to four, followed by another four years of compulsory military service. During the latter, he married the widow Marya Dmitrievna Isaeva, with whom he returned to St. Petersburg in 1859.
Dostoevsky's harrowing near-execution and his terrible years of imprisonment made an indelible impression on him, converting him to a lifelong intense spirituality. These beliefs formed the basis for his great novels.
After his release, Dostoevsky published a few short works, including "Memoirs from the House of the Dead" (1860-1861), which was based on his prison experiences, in the journal Time, which he had co-founded with his brother Mikhail. In 1862, he made his first trip abroad, to England, France, Germany, Italy, and Switzerland. While abroad, he had an affair with Apollinaria Suslova, a young and attractive student whom Dostoevsky considered an intellectual equal. He also made observations on Western society that fueled his rejection of Western philosophies as models for Russian society.
In 1863, Time was banned, so Fyodor and Mikhail founded another magazine, Epoch, which in 1864 published the complex Notes from Underground, generally considered the preface to Dostoevsky's great novels.
In that same year, both Marya Dmitrievna and Fyodor's beloved brother Mikhail died, leaving Dostoevsky saddled with debts and dependents. Apollinaria Suslova declined a marriage proposal, and in an attempt to win money through gambling, Dostoevsky mired himself further in debt. With creditors at his heels and with debts of around 43,000 rubles, Dostoevsky escaped abroad with 175 rubles in his pocket and a "slave contract" with bookseller F. T. Stellovsky. This agreement stipulated that if Dostoevsky did not produce a new novel by November 1, 1866, all rights to Dostoevsky's past and future works would revert to Stellovsky.
Time passed, and Dostoevsky, preoccupied with a longer, serialized novel, did no work on the book he had promised Stellovsky until at last, on the advice of friends, he hired the young Anna Grigorievna Snitkin as his stenographer. He dictated The Gambler to her, and the manuscript was delivered to Stellovsky on the very day their agreement was to expire. Through November, Dostoevsky completed the longer novel Crime and Punishment, which was published that year to immediate and abundant success. Fyodor proposed to Anna, and they soon were wed on February 15, 1867.
This second marriage brought Dostoevsky professional and emotional stability. Anna tolerated his compulsive gambling, managed his career, and nursed him through depression and epilepsy. His great works, notably The Idiot (1868), Demons (1871-1872, also known as The Devils or mistranslated as The Possessed), and The Brothers Karamazov, were all written in this last phase of his life.
Despite this relative success, the Dostoevskys were dogged by the massive debts left by Mikhail's death and Fyodor's gambling until about 1873. At this point, Anna became his publisher and he (according to his wife) gave up gambling. Their newfound financial stability enabled the Dostoevskys to purchase the house they had been renting in 1876, and between 1877 and 1880, Dostoevsky worked on The Brothers Karamazov, regarded by many as the apex of his career. During these last years of his life, he enjoyed prominence in his public life as well as his literary career.
Fyodor Dostoevsky died on January 28, 1881, of complications related to his epilepsy. At the funeral procession in St. Petersburg, his coffin was followed by thirty to forty thousand people. His epitaph reads, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit," which is the quotation Dostoevsky chose for the preface of The Brothers Karamazov.
Dostoevsky is one of the first writers to explore the ideas of psychoanalysis in his works. His religious ideas are still relevant in theological debate. He also is one of the seminal creators of the ideas of existentialism. Despite his varying success during his lifetime, today Dostoevsky is considered to be one of the preeminent Russian novelists—indeed, one of the preeminent novelists—of all time. |
Just a couple of days ago I was telling you about an ambitious and successful initiative to relocate black rhinos, but the situation is more dire than it appears at a first glance: the Western Black Rhino of Africa has been declared officially extinct, and two other subspecies are extremely close to meeting the same fate.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature made a new reassessment of the rhino situation, and according to them, the Western Black Rhino is now extinct, while Northern White Rhino of central Africa is “possibly extinct” and the Javan Rhino is “probably extinct”, after poachers killed the last animal there in 2010.
“A lack of political support and willpower for conservation efforts in many rhino habitats, international organized crime groups targeting rhinos and increasing illegal demand for rhino horns and commercial poaching are the main threats faced by rhinos”, the group said along with the release of the Red List of endangered species.
Meanwhile, in Mexico, an absolutely remarkable creature lives beneath the tourist gondolas, in the remains of a former Aztec lake. The axolotl, also known as the “water monster” was a very important part of the Aztec religion and diet. However, even though the Aztecs fed on it, the creature managed to survive until now; but it seems modern society is more than it can handle. This foot long salamander has never seen sadder days, as scientists and environmentalists are scrambling, trying to find a way to save it from an extinction which is likely to become official in five years, if nothing changes.
“If the axolotl disappears, it would not only be a great loss to biodiversity but to Mexican culture, and would reflect the degeneration of a once-great lake system,” says Luis Zambrano, a biologist at the Autonomous University of Mexico, or UNAM.
It has been a steep and tragic fall from grace for the weird looking creature, as millions of them inhabited the lakes near Mexico City, as the city was built. As the Aztec legend has it, Xolotl, the Aztec god of death, lightning and monsters feared he was going to be killed by the other gods, so he transformed into an axolotl and fled. But its decline began with the Spanish conquistadors, who began draining the lakes which it inhabits. They were drained more and more to quench the thirst of one of the biggest growing cities in the world. In the past 30 days, the salamanders went from being a common animal to almost extinct.
Also, about quarter of all mammals are dangerously close to extinction, but some species have successfully been brought back from the brink due to consistent and well thought efforts.
Source USA Today
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Kensington Launching Hunger Free Zone (Photos & Video)
Kensington wants to become the nation’s first hunger free zip code.
St. Paul’s United Methodist Church in Kensington is teaming up with Bethesda Help to launch an expanded food delivery service to local families in need.
The “20895—Hunger Free Zone” campaign aims to deliver a three-day supply of groceries on weekdays to Kensington-area families within 24 hours of a request for assistance.
“Several years ago we felt God calling our church to feed our neighbors in need,” says Adam Snell, senior pastor at St. Paul’s UMC Kensington. “What started in several small ways is now emerging in a big way.”
The church is distributing lawn signs for residents and businesses in Kensington to declare their homes and workplaces hunger-free zones. Postcards in English and Spanish are being sent to schools, government offices and social service agencies to inform individuals and families how to receive emergency deliveries of food.
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As the old saying goes, “Natural selection is smarter than you are,” and I continue to be amazed at the things it’s come up with. In fact, sometimes I think that biologists should invent a drinking game in which we imagine adaptations and then try to find out if they’ve actually evolved. (To ensure reality, you have to down one if you lose.) Here’s a bizarre adaptation that I heard about the other day but found hard to believe. I looked it up and, sure enough, it’s true.
There’s a species of salamander whose members actually defend themselves by poking their ribs through their skin to produce predator-deterring spines. It thus injures itself in the cause of survival.
This was reported three years ago on the BBC Earth News, and I tracked down the original report, a 2010 paper in the Journal of Zoology by Heiss et al. (reference below). The paper reports morphological and X-ray studies of the “Iberian ribbed newt,” Pleurodeles waltl, found in Spain, Portugal, and Morocco.
First, let’s see a male of the species (photo bu Javier Fuentes, taken from here); note the orange spots, which is where the ribs will poke through.
The authors examined five male and four females adult salamanders. To simulate a predator attack, the animals were repeatedly touched with a “cotton bud” (I think that’s a Q-Tip to Americans). Salamanders would then adopt a defensive posture involving either flattening or arching the body. Their ribs would then protrude, stretching the skin to make predator-deterring spines, and sometimes those ribs would actually pierce the skin (they went through the orange spots shown above). The beasts would also, like many salamanders, secrete a milky, viscous secretion on their neck, trunk (top and sides) and tail. Both behaviors are shown in the photos below:
Although the orange spots may highlight the presence of spines to the predators, they don’t contain any pores or openings through which the ribs can protrude. Dissection of salamanders killed (:-( ) while defending themselves show that the ribs do indeed poke through the skin, making holes in the body. X-rays and computed tomography show that the spines, which normally point backwards, can rotate forward as much as 50° forward to create the “spines”:
Computed tomography images, below, show the forward curvature of the ribs at the tips, which makes for better spines, and their pointy-ness, also a deterrent. The authors note that the proximal (outer) third of each rib is surrounded by a sheath of connective tissue, speculating that this can perhaps speed up closure of the wound after the ribs pierce the skin.
One question is how salamanders that secrete a presumably toxic slime at the same time they make holes in their skin can avoid poisoning themselves. After all, the toxins could enter the body through the holes. Well, like other salamanders, these are almost certainly immune to their own toxins. And this immunity is likely an evolved one, for, as the authors note, when you inject even small amounts of skin secretions from one species into members of a different species, it is fatal, while injecting your own species’ toxin into yourself has no obvious effects.
Now we’re not sure that the ribby “spines” (or secretions) really do deter predators in this species, but secreted slime has been shown to be a powerful deterrent in other species. And the fact that the erection of ribs occurs only during a simulated predation event strongly suggests that it’s an antipredator device. Showing this definitively would be difficult, as you’d have to somehow have two identical salamanders, one of which doesn’t stick out the ribs when attacked.
h/t: S.
___________________
Heiss, E., N. Natchev, D. Salaberger, M. Gumpenberger, A. Rabanser, and J. Weisgram. 2010. Hurt yourself to hurt your enemy: new insights on the function of the bizarre antipredator mechanism in the salamandrid Pleurodeles waltl. Journal of Zoology 280:156-162. |
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